BT 

2>3 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. Copyright No. 

sheifJ52T7^3 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 

I 



{Ran 



Present 
and Future. 



MAN: 



PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



BY 

George Safford. 



UTICA, N. Y. 
Press of L. C. Childs & Son , 

MDCCCXCVI. 



JdT763 

. Ss 

* 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1896, by 
George Safford, 
In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C. 




PREFACE. 

From early youth the interest of the writer 
of these pages has been drawn to the scrip- 
tures as the only means of learning the will 
of God concerning the human race. While 
yet young in years, he has listened to the can- 
did and earnest appeals of gospel ministers 
and popular revivalists, exhorting men every- 
where to repent and seek safety in the blood 
and merits of Jesus Christ. He has heard 
the pathetic story of the cross told to sympa- 
thizing listeners, and seen the hardened and 
defiant sinner bow beneath the weight of his 
high-handed rebellion and the measureless 
Love of the Friend of all, accept the Free 
Gift and rejoice in his newly-found salvation. 

He has heard in flaming eloquence the pic- 
tured agonies of the eternally lost in regions 
beyond the reach of Love and Mercy, offered 
in vivid coloring as incentive to repentance 
and reform. 



PREFACE. 



He has read and heard wrangling and dis- 
cordant dissertations on sectarian theses and 
scholastic theologies, which have from time to 
time been associated with, and incorporated 
into the plain and simple gospel of Christ. 

The impressions received in those earlier 
times, have, in later years, developed into con- 
victions that those disputed and contradictory 
tenets were not only valueless as articles of 
faith, but that they were never enjoined as 
such by the Author of our hope, and that in- 
asmuch as they were sources of contention 
among Christians ; were absolute hindrances 
to union, brotherhood and love in the church. 

And now that he has reached his allotted . 
three score and ten years, he deems it his mis- 
sion and duty to offer, as presented in these 
pages, inducements to recourse "to the Law 
and to the testimony," that the seeker after 
the truth may learn whether these things be 
so. 

There are no pretensions to scholarship 



PREFACE. 



claimed ; on the contrary, he feels that his 
want in that direction will be apparent on 
every page. 

He has permitted himself to make use of 
conjectural and imaginative passages employed 
as vehicles to bring in prophecies, or other 
scripture in support or illustration of his po- 
sition. 

Humbly hoping, therefore, that all literary 
defects may be generously overlooked and his 
honest effort honestly appreciated, and being 
fully convinced of the need of a better ac- 
quaintance with the Word of Life, he respect- 
fully presents this little work for the consid- 
eration of possible readers. 

George Safford. 

Canton, N. Y., April 12, iSgj. 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



OBJECT IN MAN'S CREATION. 

A Being lives and rules, some of whose 
attributes a finite creature may call by name, 
but, having named the few he knows, becomes 
lost in their immensity and confesses The In- 
comprehensible Creator. That finite creature 
may look abroad upon His works, and the 
moiety which he surveys confounds him. By 
the aid of science, distant worlds are placed 
within his view, and while the tears of an ex- 
alted reverence dim his vision, the light of a 
planet fixed in its place at its creation may 
have just reached him. And while the world 
extols the genius and greatness of that astron- 
omer, he casts himself in the dust, beholds the 
Hand of the Omnipotent, and discovers his 
own littleness. But while, as a finite creature, 
he grieves that The Infinite has set bounds to 
the researches of science, his consolation 
comes. 



3 



MAN I PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



" Insignificant as I now am," he cries, "the 
time will come when the vail will be lifted 
from these wonders, O God ! and I shall com- 
prehend the things that are now past finding 
out ! Unsearchable as are Thy Purposes, and 
limited as is our knowledge, it shall transpire 
that this feeble earth-born being was created 
to fulfill a grand and a glorious destiny !" Made 
* 4 a little lower than the angels,'' and in the 
image and likeness of his Maker, man by his 
disobedience, instead of continuing in that 
likeness and condition, descended in the scale, 
until in man)- cases he became like the lower 
order of animal life ; and the effect of his dis- 
obedience and consequent continuous acts not 
in harmony with the laws of his being, or in 
concord with the expressed will of his Creator, 
mutilates the original likeness, widens the dis- 
tance between man and his God and retards 
the progress of his determined destiny. 

We shall accept as conclusive evidence of 
the object and intention of Divine purpose to 
make man the creature of His care, his Love, 
and the recipient of all of perfect happiness 
which his present or future capabilities will al- 
low ; the fact that such was his condition at his 



OBJECT IN MAN'S CREATION. 



9 



creation, as related in the Scriptures ; the ap- 
parent fact of his progress in his present stage 
of being, and a Bible full of unmistakable 
promises of exalted conditions in the life to 
come. 

The kindly hearted man, who, finding an 
orphan child in the street, shivering with cold 
and faint with hunger, took it to his own 
home ; warmed and fed it ; clothed and com- 
forted it and gave it a place among his own 
children ; tolerated the waywardness which 
was the sure result of its former surroundings ; 
threw open the doors of education and prog- 
ress and placed it within the reach of the mys- 
teries of science and the benefits of christian 
teaching and example ; while he demonstrates 
the fact that charity is the crowning excellence 
of human attributes ; almost proves that God 
in his Infinite Love, purposes to act in refer- 
ence to humanity, in an infinite degree, on the 
same loving and glorious plan. 

The countless millions who have lived, do, 
and shall live upon this earth make up the 
Revelators ' ' multitude whom no man can 
number." Whatever may have been, is, or 
may be their condition, we are forced to con- 



IO 



MAN *. PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



cede that they were made according to God's 
Will and for His pleasure ; and it is not to be 
supposed that His purpose in them could be 
fulfilled short of the highest possible happiness 
that their capabilities would permit. 

Whatever the innate thirst for knowledge 
in natural or human science, for insight into 
the works of God and for immortality of ex- 
istence in a state of eternal and perfect happi- 
ness, the present man possesses ; when the 
fullness of the Father's time shall come, and 
the fullness of His number shall be complete ; 
the race of Adam will be far more than grati- 
fied, and will ascribe Glory and Honor unto 
Him Whose loving object in man's creation 
was to make him a being on whom He could 
lavish all of knowledge, all of joy, and all of 
Infinite Love, that his eternally increasing 
capabilities could contain. 



ACCOUNTABILITY OF MAN. 



If the Darwinian theory of man's origin be 
the correct one, it is evident that his incipient 
stage or stages were fixed in pre-historic dates, 
or prior to the arrangement of this present 
form of our earth. The " let us make man in 
our own image and likeness " of Gen. 1:26, 
instead of forbidding the entertainment of such 
a theory, supposes its probability, and leaves 
ground for speculative consideration ; the 
thought offering itself, that man had existed in 
gradual orders, and was at historic creation to 
be elevated in his being to the image and like- 
ness of his Maker. Also, the fact that in all 
of man's future, he continually rises to higher 
planes of being ; which analogy of future to 
past, may perhaps offer grounds for profitable 
hypothesis. 

Placed then in as happy a condition as his 
state of being would admit, man became a 
candidate for all the free gifts and loving favors 
that an Almighty Father could confer. 
Representing the highest order of animal life, 



12 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



with an intelligence competent to comprehend 
his responsibilities, the test of obedience was 
given him. We may, I think, safely aver that 
had Adam kept the command in that one in- 
stance, no further trials would have been 
given him. But alas, he disobeyed and ate 
the fruit of the proscribed tree, r< whose mor- 
tal taste brought death into the world and all 
our woe." And ever since that disastrous 
hour man has suffered the dire conse- 
quences. Compelled to wear out his physical 
being to secure his natural sustenance, in- 
stead of being a little lower than the angels, 
he is condemned to a plane but little higher 
than the creatures over which he was given 
dominion. Compelled to reproduce his 
species after the manner of the brute creation ; 
to ' ' eat his bread in the sweat of his face" and 
assimilate his food like other animals. And, 
reader, as long as the Cherubims and flaming 
sword prevents access to the Tree of Life, 
such must be the condition of the children of 
men. He enters his existence with a wail ; 
sickness and sorrow and sin are his compan- 
ions until he reaches the physical zenith of 
his life ; sickness and sorrow and sin follow 



ACCOUNTABILITY OF MAX. 



13 



him through all his downward road till death 
points to his future and his past, and closes 
his present. Gloomy picture ! Fearful re- 
sults of disobedience and a violated account- 
ability. 4 k Adam, where art thou ? Who told 
thee that thou wast naked ? Hast thou eaten 
of the tree whereof I commanded thee that 
thou shouldst not eat ?" and kk what hast thou 
done ?" given in the story of the fall, estab- 
lish the fact of man's accountability beyond 
possible controversy. And yet added to this, 
his accountability to his fellow-creatures below 
and above him in the scale of social position, 
offers conclusive evidence of accountability to 
the Supreme Power. 

All law is based upon accountability, and 
without either the other could not exist. 



ACT AND EFFECT OF MAN'S DISO- 
BEDIENCE. 



Before entering on the topics of this subject 
it may be advisable to define the two words 
of our caption, Present and Future, as herein 
treated. The reader will please understand 
the term Present as involving all the time from 
Adam's earliest hour to the closing moments 
of this stage of man's existence ;• and Future 
to mean all w 7 e can know of things belonging 
to ages succeeding the first resurrection. 
Whether the garden of Eden, "the tree of 
the knowledge of good and evil" and "The 
Tree of Life " are to be accepted in a literal 
sense, or, as figurative, may perhaps be left 
to conflicting decisions of opinion ; but the 
writer from the fact of the literality of all the 
other trees mentioned with their specified uses 
as being planted for man's sustenance and 
gratification, is strongly inclined to the literal 
view. He also sees no other way in which 
Adam could have sinned, except through his 
appetite. The fact that every tree in Eden 



ACT AND EFFECT OF MANS DISOBEDIENCE. I 5 

was designed for man's unrestrained use, proves 
conclusively that both the forbidden tree and 
the tree of life were designed for his happi- 
ness ; priority of the partaking being God's 
design in the proscription. To partake of the 
fruit of the tree of life was not prohibited ; 
but, having disobeyed and sown thereby the 
consequent results of sin and death in himself 
and all successive progeny, these conditions 
through all ages of his future must necessarily 
be continued, unless frustrated by the interpo- 
sition of the Creator. Observe the proof. 
"Now lest he put forth his hand and take 
also of the tree of life and eat and live 
forever ; therefore the Lord God sent him 
forth from the Garden of Eden to till 
the ground from which he was taken. So He 
drove out the man, and He placed at the east 
of the garden of Eden Cherubim^ and a flam- 
ing sword, which turned every way, to keep 
the way of the tree of life." 

The history of these acts, rendered in lan- 
guage suited to the comprehension of finite 
minds, manifest the kk goodness and severity 
of God." Kept by divine interposition from 
making himself endlessly miserable, all the 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



children of men back to Adam, and forward 
through all the ceaseless ages of an eternal ex- 
istence, may find a fitting theme whose har- 
monies shall ascribe loftiest praises to the 
Loving Father who stood between them and 
hopeless ruin. 

Had man eaten of the tree of life instead of 
the forbidden one, the next visit his Maker 
made him would have held — what different 
purposes toward him ! ' Instead of seeking 
him to curse him and His new creation for his 
sake, his greeting might have been : ' 1 Well 
done ! I have come down to tell thee that 
thou hast secured to thyself and to the mil- 
lions who shall owe their parentage to thee, 
my chiefest attribute, Eternal Life ! Noth- 
ing can ever disturb thee or mar thy joy. All 
the happiness thy Maker can devise shall be 
thine. And I have come down to tell thee 
that the command wherewith I forbade thee 
to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and 
evil, which standeth in the midst of the gar- 
den, is become of none effect ; and thou and 
Eve may add to your joy by freely partaking 
of its fruit. And I also tell thee that the mo- 
ment the first morsel of the fruit of the tree of 



ACT AND EFFECT OF MANS DISOBEDIENCE. I 7 

life passed your lips a shout to which distant 
worlds responded went up from around the 
Throne of the Highest !" 

But Adam and Eve's confession of disobedi- 
ence and consequent sorrow for their fault 
could not cancel the sin or avert the conse- 
quences due. Not all the united philanthropy 
of earth could formulate a scheme to place 
man beyond the reach of sin and death. 
Plato, in his broad love for his fellow man, 
could only give grand and noble rules of life, 
and offer him as palliation, the theory of the 
immortality of the human soul. Who lives, 
or has lived, but has seen his brightest earthly 
hopes laid in the dust ! How many have 
tasted and are still tasting the bitter fruits of 
disobedience ! Who has not watched with 
heart-breaking sorrow the failing health and 
wasting strength of father, mother, brother, 
sister, or other loved one, in their slow and 
sure and weary journey to the grave ! And,, 
darkest picture of all, how many have k k sor- 
rowed as those without hope !" 

O fearful effect of transgression ! And dire- 
ful as it is, sin still follows sin, and will still 
abide until the fullness of God's time shall 
2 



I 8 MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 

come, and almighty power and limitless love 
stands between man and the effect of his diso- 
bedience. 



THE WAY. 



The writer believes the number of those 
who will enter upon eternity under existing 
conditions of man's life will be far greater than 
it would have been had sin not changed his 
relations to his Maker. It was plainly intend- 
ed by the Creator that reproduction of his 
species should be on a far lower scale in point 
of numbers. k k I will greatly multiply thy 
sorrows and thy conception," sufficiently evi- 
dences this fact. Had man not disobeyed, his 
progeny would most certainly have survived, 
and surviving, wo aid not by millions have 
equalled the vast increase of the race under 
present conditions. 

When the fullness of God's time shall have 
come, and the fullness of His k ' multitude 
whom no man can number " shall be accom- 
plished ; when k k unto Him shall the gathering 
of the people be we shall be satisfied with 
the incomputable number, and God, — as when 
man came from the hands of his Maker, — will 
pronounce them 4 'good." 



20 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



But — the way — the means — the plan em- 
ployed to bring about this great revolution in 
the condition of the human race. This way 
has been scoffed at and sneered at in most by 
men who have taken the conclusions of secta- 
rians as exponents of the Word of God. Dif- 
ferent commentators have given different ren- 
derings very much at war with each other, and 
without seeking for themselves, accept for fact 
that church dogmas and academic theologies 
represent Revelation, and are to be taken as 
the teachings of the Bible. 

The plain and unqualified declarations of 
John 14:6 harmonizes with prophecy, with the 
mundane life of Jesus Christ and with the faith 
of the church's millions. It is also in harmony 
with, and sufficient for the needs of man : 
' ' I am the Way, the Truth and the Life ! No 
man cometh unto the Father, but by Me !" 

It has seemed to some ' ' a small thing " that 
the partaking of the fruit of one of the trees 
of Eden should produce so great disaster to 
the human family ; and the act has been pro- 
nounced as not commensurate with results. 
The fact that those results are before us is be- 
yond the need of evidence ; while the removal 



THE WAY. 



21 



of them becomes the paramount concern of 
the children of men, and has employed the 
Wisdom and Love of their Creator. Let us 
here consider the relations between man and 
man by way ot analogy. We have seen — 
ever since a third person existed — all the way 
down from Cain's protest, the uses of media- 
tion and advocacy in reconciling man to his 
brother man, and we accept mediatorial offices 
as indispensable in the economy of life. What 
better system, what more perfect plan, in 
short what other way so fitting as the one 
adopted by the All Father — the scheme of the 
mediation and advocacy of a Being qualified 
by His high position, by His voluntary sacri- 
fice of life, to accomplish the restoration back 
to the limitless favor from which the creature 
had fallen ? 

Man's absorbing business in this world should 
be to gain through obedience in Christ what 
he lost by disobedience in Adam ; the right of 
access to the Tree of Life. 

At a time w T hen an ambitious and an idola- 
trous nation held the supremacy of the world ; 
when Jerusalem and all the children of Jacob 
chafed beneath the shameful yoke of heathen 



22 



MAN I PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



bondage, and searched amid the mazes of 
prophecy for the Promise of the Messiah to 
appear and interpose in their behalf, to break 
the shackles of their servitude and establish 
the kingdom guaranteed to Israel through the 
Abrahamic covenant ; immense crowds nearly 
depopulated Jerusalem and the villages of 
Judea ; and with interested eagerness pressed 
onward to the wilds of Jordan, where a strange 
and earnest preacher was exhorting the vast 
concourse to ''repent, for the Kingdom of 
Heaven" was "at hand." The children of 
Israel were elated with and believed in the 
fact that this same John the Baptist was the 
one foretold by prophecy, who should prepare 
the way of Shiloh. Few dissenting voices 
were heard, and many were "baptized in 
Jordan confessing their sins." To what a 
height of hopeful joy must their expectations 
have risen, when in sight of all, and in hearing 
of all, Heaven gave its testimony to the ad- 
vent and presence of the anointed Prince ! 

But the inclinations of the Rabbins to man- 
ufacture theologies, a proclivity peculiar to 
Jewish doctors of the law, had, long prior to 
this era, rendered the promises of God to 



THE WAY. 



Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob, which prom- 
ises were reiterated by the mouth of the 
prophets, of 4 k none effect." We may, I 
think, safely entertain the belief that the 
many secular reverses and captivities of the 
chosen people were the principal cause of this 
wrong rendering of the condition of the Mes- 
siahship ; desirous as they certainly would be 
for the coming of a prince who would lead 
their armies to certain victory, and reign the 
sole ruler of the world. 

To the Jews were 'especially committed the 
keeping of the covenants, the law and the 
prophecies, and all of the then revealed w 7 ill 
of God to mankind. And to them belongs the 
act of throwing wide the doors of license 
to clerical perversions, man-made theologies, 
absurd and false systems, ridiculous tradi- 
tions and legendary monstrosities ; them- 
selves wresting the most important feature of 
Divine Revelation to an extent which no Bible 
student will concede it can bear. 

The eyes of all Jerusalem were fixed upon 
every move and action of the lowly and pure- 
minded stranger who walked its streets, who 
spoke in its temple, who read and expounded 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



the law in the synagogues, who rendered the 
beautiful prophecies and threw floods of light 
on their sublime and poetic figures, who 
silenced the disputations of the doctors, who 
gave health to the sick, hearing to the deaf, 
sight to the blind, and who re-animated and 
restored the dead. 

But instead of the scepter and an invincible 
army, behold a staff and a handful of poor 
and obscure fishermen. Instead of a chariot 
of burnished gold and a throne of priceless 
gems, behold a weary traveller making His 
progress on foot, the earth serving for His 
throne and His pillow. 

1 4 He came to His own and His own received 
Him not," because He came not in accordance 
with outraged prophecy. 

Reader, search carefully the scriptures and 
you will be abundantly convinced that the 
coming of the Messiah in the pomp and glory 
foretold of Him, could never, never have oc- 
curred in this present stage of earth. He came 
as the Way. I counsel you to accept of His 
Truth that you may enter into His Life. 

Let us suppose, by way of illustration, that 
it became the business of mankind to devise a 



THE WAY. 



way whereby the present human race might 
become reconciled to an universal potentate, 
against whom every person had rebelled and 
had defied, and of whom many who were far- 
thest from him proclaimed that there was no 
such king ; that he was a myth, and existed 
Oiily in the low and unworthy idea of reverence 
for an imaginary superior being. Suppose that 
in their local convention the people elected the 
best and the wisest as delegates to a congress 
which should be empowered to formulate a 
scheme by which every one concerned might 
be eligible to be partakers in its advantages. 
Suppose, as the result of mature and earnest 
deliberation, they had fallen on and acquiesced 
in a plan like the following : k< A person shall 
be sought out — pure-minded and sinless as an 
infant, gifted with the highest order of intelli- 
gence ; whose holy and blameless life, whose 
lofty example and pure precept attracts our re- 
spect and inspires our love ; whose power over 
human infirmities joined to a God-like presence 
extorts from the w r orld the admission that he 
bears the nearest relationship to the King. 
Let this personage secure a train of followers, 
humble in heart and as nearly like Adam in the 



26 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



hour of his creation as may be ; for, in such a 
world of wickedness, we believe such to be his 
most befitting company. We propose that he 
leave his paternal abode and without home or 
possessions wander from place to place fulfill- 
ing the work most in accord with the righteous 
King's pleasure ; bearing patiently the scoffs 
and jeers of a hardened and rebellious race, 
and the hatred and persecution of a jealous 
and vindictive priesthood. We design further, 
that he make his appearance at the city of 
Jerusalem, that place being at once the greatest 
seat of h}/pocrisy and the true service of the 
King upon earth, and the resort of people from 
all nations. He shall perfectly understand his 
mission and the manner in which his enemies 
shall deal with him, and the entire purpose for 
which he labors. And that he may the more 
effectually "draw all men unto him" he shall 
voluntarily yield up a pure and perfect life by 
being "lifted up" and crucified upon a Roman 
cross on Calvary, a mountain near Jerusalem, 
whereon the conquerors of the Jews executed 
the sentence of death upon malefactors." 

How perfectly satisfied *vould a world whose 
welfare was involved in such issues express 



THE WAY. 



27 



itself. What millions of treasure have been 
expended in monuments to the memory of 
those who have given their lives for their 
country's sake. We think on war, and tears 
flow for its dead, and we hold them in vener- 
ation. But in the Divine economy but one 
sacrifice was deemed necessary for the recon- 
ciliation of a world. Important and valuable 
as is every human being that has lived, lives, 
or shall live, the death of the humanity of one 
was accepted as an equivalent. 

God did not send forth His mandate order- 
ing the execution of the ringleaders in this un- 
called for and wicked rebellion ; no, not one 
was destined to suffer more than the just and 
decreed penalty of his disobedience. 

The sins, the sufferings and death of a 
''multitude whom no man can number" 
were laid upon that one ; and every sin, and 
every suffering and every death shall, in God's 
eternal and sinless future, give place to their 
extremest opposites. Mankind are wholly 
human, wholly finite ; they have only reached 
a higher standard of being than that attained 
in ages prior to our present. Therefore the 
Creator deals with us as such. His revelation 



28 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



to us is clothed in language that we, as 
finite creatures, can easily comprehend. In 
no manner or place does He call upon us to 
endeavor to solve the mysteries of infinity. 

When the Master's closest friend was 
favored with a vision of the " Holy City, New 
Jerusalem," he was obliged to describe its 
radiant glory by comparisons with finite and 
perishable baubles of earth; "gold" and 
precious stones and " clear glass " John knew 
in that day, and we believe at this day that 
all the shining gems to which he compared 
the glories he beheld would have been luster- 
less had they formed any part of any belong- 
ings to his beatific view. Accordingly, in re- 
vealing; the Way, a language and a plan were 
employed commensurate with the intelligence 
and ability of the creature to be benefited. 
God sends us one who, by His perfection of 
character, wins our admiration ; who, by His 
teaching and His works, draws us among the 
multitude to hear Him ; the manner of whose 
life and death touches our sympathies, and if 
we can but feel that His mission was to us, 
and that His life was sacrificed for us person- 
ally, we bow at His feet, deplore the disobe- 



THE WAY. 



29 



dience that rendered so great an effort in our 
behalf necessary, avow our faith in Him and 
are forgiven and accepted by Him. 

The disciples of Jesus were unlearned, sus- 
ceptible and pure-minded men ; unbiased only 
by the false rendering of the Jewish fathers 
concerning the advent of the Messiah, and 
although in constant hearing of the Master's 
teachings, they appear to have carried their 
erroneous opinions down to His resurrection 
from the dead. We find no strenuous effort 
made by Him to correct their belief in regard 
to this, and He seemed perfectly satisfied 
with their entirely trustful faith. They be- 
lieved on Him and that was, as now, all- 
sufficient. That was the burden of His great 
and loving mission, and it tells us that no 
other theologies are indispensible, or neces- 
sary to the salvation of the children of men, 
but 44 Christ and Him Crucified !" 

He requires that His followers disregard 
the 4 4 vain traditions of men " and put on the 
simplicity of Adamic innocence, or, as ren- 
dered in His own words, they should* become 
the 4 4 little child" of Matt. 18:4 ; such condi- 
tion being the only door of entrance to the 



30 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Kingdom of God. How poor, how weak and 
how more than valueless then the lofty and 
labored and ingenious theologies of the sec- 
tarian scholiast, which from of old have only 
served to 44 darken counsel by words without 
knowledge." 

One glorious ray, however, pierces the dark 
shadows they have erringly thrown over the 
fair tracery of the beautiful and simple Gos- 
pel. They have themselves without doubt 
been in that child-like state required ; have 
confessed the Master, and the Master has con- 
fessed them ; and the fruits of their assiduous 
and scholarly researches have been borne in 
the love and fear of God, and with the fervent 
desire of furthering His Glory. 

Let us present a few of those discrepancies 
which go to make up the religious tenets of 
to-day ; nearly all denominations of Christians 
basing their faith on 44 Christ and Him Cru- 
cified." 

You are called upon to believe, as the result 
of profoundest study and research, that God 
in long-passed ages elected and predestined the 
righteous to their future bliss, and the wicked 
to their doom. Another offers you the free- 



THE WAY. 



31 



dom of your agency, and counsels you to make 
.a wise choice. 

One declares it to be the determined will of 
the Father to save through the merits of the 
Son, every one made in His image, and to con- 
fer upon them an eternity of perfect happi- 
ness. 

Another teaches that Divine Justice can 
never, throughout all the vast ages of the eter- 
nal state, be satisfied ; that they must suffer, 
as long as God exists, in most intense torture, 
and that in sight of the redeemed. 

One proves by chapter and verse, that if you, 
penitent at the foot of the cross, accept the 
pardoning mercy of "the lifted up," Christ 
will be formed in you a sure hope of salvation, 
and He ' ' will be in you a well of water, spring- 
ing up unto Everlasting Life," and that you 
will be His when He makes up His jewels, and 
that none shall pluck you out of the loving 
hand. Another founds the belief on the same 
Bible, that if, after you secure the best inter- 
est in the Blood of the Atonement which your 
penitence and surrender, by the grace of Christ 
entitle you, you yield yourselves under the 
wiles of Satan or the snares of the world to 



32 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



temptation, your acceptance will be cancelled, 
and you will be as hopelessly lost as when the 
Holy Spirit first whispered you to seek the 
Kingdom of God and His Righteousness. 

One insists that God will destroy with one 
fell stroke every child of Adam who remains 
impenitent until death blots out his Present, 
leaving not one alive who made not his calling 
and election sure in his earthly life. 

Another declares that this latter, together 
with many others relating to destiny, is but 
the lamentable outcome of the efforts of finite 
minds to follow the counsels of the infinite 
through the gates of infinity. And so on, and 
on, through all the labyrinthian mazes of con- 
flicting dogmas, until the wearied and per- 
plexed hearer despairs of the truth, and is on 
the fearful verge of arraigning the Bible as a 
collection of contradictory doctrines. O ye, 
who formed by the capable hand of the maker 
of all the wonderful works you behold day by 
day, by that loving being who abated you for 
the express purpose of having innumerable 
objects on which to lavish His limitless love, 
by one who is abundantly able to carry out 
His grand designs concerning you ; do you 



THE WAY. 



33 



deem it of little or of no consequence that you 
daily and hourly refuse his ready overtures ? 
What harm will it do you if you should sub- 
mit to His rule, follow his precepts and abide 
in His love ? And in connection with this 
question, What harm will it do you if you 
will not ? 

Will you not yield your own judgment as 
regards your own value, that uncounted wealth 
vested in you in favor of Almighty discern- 
ment and competent ability to raise you to 
priceless worth ? Do you realize that this 
Way, if you will walk in it in this present, 
will give you a passport into a blissful king- 
dom at the first resurrection ? Do you, will 
you candidly consider the thought that if you 
forsake your sins and avail yourselves of the 
cleansing blood, the master will, at the close 
of your present, hide your lives with Himself 
in God ? Will you reflect that you are acting 
an ingratitude that outrages the coarsest sen- 
timent of the very vilest ? 

By the father's design toward you in your 
creation ; by His ownership of you in that 
creation ; by His willingness to make you 
more peculiarly His own by the spirit of adop- 
3 



34 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



tion ; by His long-suffering and a patience 
that only an infinite God could manifest ; by 
all who have joyfully given up their Present 
and are now resting in the hope of a brighter 
and a happier Future ; by those multitudes 
who have lived out their priceless Present 
without a hope in Christ or even a passing in- 
terest in His death ; by that august and celes- 
tial council which framed the wonderful plan 
of human restoration ; by the sacrifice which 
that council deemed effectual ; by the priva- 
tions and deprivations of the Man of Sorrows 
m His earthly life and his voluntary assumption 
of our ingratitude, our rebellion and our sins, 
and, at last a most cruel and shameful death, 
thereby making manifest the height and depth 
of the love He bore you ; by the rapt joy that 
heralds the repentance of a sinner around the 
Throne of the Highest ; by all the here name- 
less inducements that are lovingly and faith- 
fully held out to you ; I counsel you, I be- 
seech you, I importune you, I implore you to 
" return! Come !" and set your devious feet 
in the " Way !" 



WALKING IN THE WAY. 



Rome, ever ready to accord honor or praise 
where honor or praise was due, had watched 
with a curiosity closely allied to interest, the 
thrilling and wonderful details belonging to 
the life and death of the marvelous Being 
who called himself the Son of Man. The 
soldiery of Rome had been quartered in Judea 
during every event of the mission of our 
Savior, and as the, to them, peculiar religion 
of the Jews had already attracted deep re- 
search ; none knew better than the scholars 
of Italy and Greece that in the person of 
Jesus of Nazareth the Hebrew prophecies 
were abundantly fulfilled, and on account of 
the palpably false renderings of their own 
sacred writings by the Hebrew Rabbins and 
the savage and murderous hatred of their 
priesthood, Rome was already leaning toward 
Christianity. 

The conversion to the new faith of the bit- 
terest persecutor of the followers of the great 
Sacrifice to the altar of Atonement, and the 



36 



MAN I PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



grand line of circumstances that befel the 
apostle of the Gentiles, took the most pro- 
found reasoner of his age from the seat of the 
worship of the true God to the throne of Ro- 
man supremacy ; and there, from at once his 
home, his prison and his chapel, his strong- 
faith, his eloquent and irresistible argument 
and his vast learning in the mysteries of the 
religion of God and of pagan mythology, 
brought the Mistress of the World to kiss the 
Cross whereon she had hung the Hope of the 
World in the blindness of her enlightened 
heathenism. 

But Rome carried with her into the Church 
the secular sword of conquest and proposed, 
because she ruled in temporal, to rule also in 
spiritual things. 

In order to make the Church of Christ uni- 
form and catholic, a system of rules and ob- 
servances were enjoined by virtue of her as- 
sumed supremacy, and gathering the fruits of 
Paul's labor elsewhere, and also those of the 
other apostles, the Bride, the Lamb's Wife- — 
all save a few Ebionites and a few outspoken 
and independent among the Israelites became 
the Church of Rome. 



WALKING IN THE WAY. 



37 



Finding in after years that the many dog- 
mas and rules of faith belonging to the uni- 
versal church were promulgated and enjoined 
without — in the opinion of those who desired 
to reform what they considered abuses — suffi- 
cient warrant in the original Gospel of Christ, 
reform was deemed necessary. Those who 
undertook this reformation were fruitful in 
theses and dogmas and doctrines, and as 
many sects have arisen as the many render- 
ings of the Word of Life could possibly per- 
mit. 

But to go back to the earlier worshippers of 
God. 

Certain acts of obedience were required of 
all who acknowledged the one true God as the 
ruler of the family of man and as their Deity. 
The object of such obedience was to make the 
separation apparent between the worshippers 
of the true God and those who served idols ; 
to cause His votary to feel assurance of his 
acceptance, and to let the light of his right- 
eousness shine upon his fellow beings, thereby 
drawing them into the paths of truth, and aid- 
ing them to reap the unspeakable rewards of 
Walking in the Way. It is very clear that 



38 MAN: PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



the earlier sacrifices and offerings of the peo- 
ple of God were not in obedience to divine 
command, but were purely voluntary on the 
part of the votary. When the Preacher of 
Righteousness came forth from the ark and 
looked abroad upon the silence and desolation 
that brooded over the earth and reflected that 
himself and his family w r ere the only human 
beings living, his sense of gratitude for his 
great deliverance impelled him to build " an 
altar unto the Lord " and offer a sacrifice 
thereon. 

Upon God's promise to Abraham to give the 
land of Canaan to his seed, his impulse was 
to "build an altar unto the Lord." On his 
arrival at Beth-el, or between that place and 
Hai, he also built an altar. Again, in the 
plains of Mamre, after the separation of Lot 
from him, and on the renewal of the Promise, 
he built another altar. The next altar of which 
we read, was built to demonstrate the faith 
and obedience of Abraham and to shadow forth 
the Way, in which all the nations of the earth 
should be blessed. 

This appears to be the first sacrifice that 
God ordained, and it is notable that it was so 



WALKING IN THE WAY. 



39 



very like the one in which the Only Son truly 
became the victim. The last one ! It is de- 
sired only to bring to notice the fact that the 
sacrifice belonging to the Mosaic dispensation, 
was not, until many years practiced, an ordi- 
nance by the command of God. He accepted 
their offerings in the spirit of worship, and not 
until men had signified their preference for that 
form of thanksgiving or invocation or covenant 
ratification, did He ordain it. 

But the entire law of sacrificial atonement 
given through Moses to the children of Israel, 
had in its every letter the sublime principles 
involved in God's promise to Abraham ; faith 
in the faithful covenant ; keeping in view the 
sacrifice, only efficacious, and only acceptable, 
in which the hand of the slayer should not be 
stayed, no substitution made ; but the blood 
of the chosen victim should be shed. This, 
while it in some manner answers the cavils of 
skepticism in relation to the uses and efficacy 
of the blood of the creatures sacrificed, offers 
us perhaps the true reason why, in language 
within the comprehension of men, and to keep 
alive a remembrance and a reverence for the 
aith of Abraham ; Jesus Christ is so often 

f 



40 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



called, in connection with His death : The Son 
of God. 

When in process of time, the children of 
Israel had lived long enough to make them- 
selves a history, when the inspired prophets 
had foretold the final gathering and "restitu- 
tion of all things," and the humiliation and 
death of the final sacrifice, and when the sacred 
traditions of the chosen people were recorded 
in books ; then it was that the learned, as at 
this day, desirous of a share in common with 
" Holy Men of Old," began to wrest the sim- 
ple theology of the scriptures by denying the 
Messiah in the plainly foretold form of a sacri- 
fice, and accepting Him only as King. They 
drew from the prophecies nothing but the pa- 
geantry ; while they discarded the symbol in 
God's command to the "Father of the Faith- 
ful," and therefore rendered the worship by ob- 
lation and sacrifice, an "abomination unto 
the Lord." 

This is how "He came to His own, and His 
own received Him not." This is how Isaiah's 
"people had gone astray' ; had every one 
"turned to his own way" and bound heavier 
to the shoulders of the "Man of sorrows, the 



I 

WALKING IN THE WAY. 4 1 

iniquities of us all." This is how they ceased 
to walk in the Way, and how Christ, instead 
of being 4 ' formed within them the Hope of 
glory," became a k ' stumbling-stone and a rock 
of offence to both the houses of Israel." 

And for this cause, because God hath not 
"cast off His people" the prophets foretell 
• k a high way and a way " in the which their folly 
can not lead them into error ; and zcill, as 
promised to Abraham, lead them back to the 
shelter of the covenant ; but not in this Pres- 
ent. 

It is an established principle that the acts of 
men, through their own agency, necessitates a 
change in the Creator's dealings with them. 

Had the ancient Rabbins staid their hand 
from casting the black pall of unbelief and dis- 
obedience over their own and succeeding gen- 
erations by their arbitrary and sacrilegious 
mutilation of the plain and literal Scriptures, 
by their false rendering of the Abrahamic 
Promise — the highest and noblest theme of 
the prophets — the children of Israel, doubt- 
less, would be to-day a Christian nation. 
They would have been alert with hope and a 
consciousness of the fulfillment of the proph- 



42 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



ecies of the Messiah given in their sacred 
books. When they saw the Babe in the Man- 
ger at Bethlehem, they would have ran 
wild with holy joy to meet one another with 
the faithful words of Philip in their mouths : 
" We have found Him of whom Moses in the 
law and the prophets did write Jesus of Naz- 
areth, the son of Joseph !" At the times when 
but a child He manifested a perfect knowledge 
of the law and the prophets, they would have 
shouted aloud from the housetops and in the 
streets, and in their sacred temple, behold the 
prophet, whom the Lord our God hath raised 
up like unto Moses ; Him will we hear in all 
things ! Instead of being disappointed and 
cast down because He drove not out the Ro- 
mans' and took possession of the kingdom 
with all the appointments of royalty, they 
could have said to them, "Behold your 
King !" " Yet a little while and the sword of 
His spirit shall conquer and bring you to His 
feet" in loving subjection. 

The incalculable influence of the only peo- 
ple who daily read the revealed will of God 
concerning them would, without doubt, have 
"cut the work short in righteousness," made 



WALKING IN THE WAY. 



43 



the heathen His inheritance, and fulfill the 
dear words: kl Thy Kingdom Come." O 
fearful results of perverting the word of Life 1 
O House of Israel ! Children of Calamity ! 
the despised gentiles and the worst characters 
among mankind " go into the Kingdom of God 
before you !" Unfortunate people ! Ye will 
not enter into the kingdom yourselves, and ye 
persevere in hindering others. Now must ye 
wait and 14 look for another, " until God' shigh- 
way shall be cast up, until He shall take away 
your rebellious agency, and you with the na- 
tions whither ye are driven, shall bow the 
knee and look upon and confess whom ye 
have k ' denied, " and whom ye k k have pierced. " 

Question : What would be. or would have 
been, the result had the Jews left the letter 
and spirit of prophecy where the}- found it ? 

For the prophets, clean down to the last 
who foretold the Messiah fully knew, and fully 
believed the words put into their mouths by 
the spirit of God ; and fully understood, that, 
during the ages while sin reigned, no kingdom 
could be established in the pomp and glory m 
which they described the literal reign of the 
Sovereign of the world, 



44 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



4 'Children of the Promise, your house is 
left unto you desolate." Ye have no abiding 
place ; ye are pilgrims and strangers among the 
nations whither ye are driven. Many of you 
have lost your identity and your religion, and 
those who have not, are still teaching and ac- 
cepting 4 * for doctrine the commandments of 
men." Why will you not let 4 4 the time past 
suffice" for rebellion and stubbornness, and al- 
low Him at this late day to "gather you un- 
der His wings. Then and never till then can 
you hold any right to expect the reign of the 
Christ in the glory of His Father as predicted 
by your prophets. He must be accepted by 
you in His humiliation and according to the 
terms of the covenant with your fathers, be- 
fore He can accept you, or make you sharers 
in the blessings of the restitution. 

O would you turn your eyes back to Calvary 
and read Pilate's inscription, whether prophetic 
I may not say ; placed above the thorn- 
crowned head of y.ur best friend and only 
hope, and after your long and dreary waiting, 
confess Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the 
Jews. 

44 Stand ye in the ways and see, and ask for 



WALKING IN THE WAY. 



45 



the old paths, where is the good way, and 
walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your 
souls." 

But God be praised, that, although the Jew- 
ish Rabbins did violence to the covenant of 
grace, and to the letter and spirit of prophecy, 
the full and comprehensive text remains to us, 
wherein the ' ' strait gate " and the 4 ' narrow 7 
way " leads through all the perversions, all the 
wrestings and all the traditions and legends of 
early ages, and all the sectarian doctrines of 
later days, by well-defined and clear way- 
marks, to eternal rest. 

And God be praised, that notwithstanding 
the multitude of theological opinions held in 
sectarian branches of the Christian church, the 
basis of our faith is Christ and Him crucified, 
and that w 7 e are firm and unshaken in the be- 
lief that there is 4 'none other name under 
heaven, given among men, whereby we must 
be saved." 

The time has been when bickering and strife 
and rancor, and if we look back to the earlier 
days of the church, we shall find that even 
death has been the result of theological differ- 
ences. 



4 6 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



But sectarian opinions wax less and less 
in value, and when the day comes when man- 
made and clerical theologies are taken at their 
true worth, they will be of no more impor- 
tance to the followers of our Divine Master 
than they are accounted of by Him. The 
writer fully believes that all true Christians, 
of whatever name, are Walking in the Way 
that leads to one Church; and onward through 
that Church in the way that leads to a glori- 
ous and a blissful future. 

Christian, let us cast away what remains of 
these foolish differences ; let the light radi- 
ating from the Prince of Light illumine the 
priceless truth of revelation, and let us pray 
that it may guide us while Walking in the 
Way. 



DESTINY OF MAN'S PRESENT. 



Destiny, as applied to man in this life, in- 
volves all that befalls him from the moment 
when his nostrils received the breath of exist- 
ence on through all his days on this earth, 
and into his eternal future, where, could we 
trace him, we should find that he had not yet 
reached, even after the lapse of infinite ages, 
the high plane of being designed by his Cre- 
ator. We have seen that the attribute of a 
limited agency was given to man at his crea- 
tion, and how he abused that gift and in- 
curred the conditions of accountability, in- 
volving sin to the extent that no act on his 
part could remove the results of disobedience. 

From that moment the Word becomes of 
the utmost interest to man, for it points him 
to the open way in which his reconciliation 
may be effected. The necessity for the prep- 
aration of this way was made by man, but 
helpless in his situation, God furnishes the 
means of his restoration and only asks that 
he accept. If he does, he becomes bound to, 



48 MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



and inseparable from, the high destiny de- 
creed for him, and is also the recipient of a 
sure hope to cheer him in the Way. 

And permit me here to say to you that no 
act of man — no amount of rebellion or trans- 
gression ; not all his pride, all his high-handed 
wickedness, all his contempt for the overtures 
of His grace shall thwart God's great design 
in the grand destiny of the human race. Man 
disobeys the Divine Law and he suffers the 
loss of the joys and consolations his obedience 
would have secured to him, and the climax of 
the curse pronounced in Adam, and nothing- 
more. He disobeys the fixed laws of his own 
natural being, and suffers in common with all 
flesh, the pending consequences, which often 
culminate in death. He has the Present given 
to him to fix, by the freedom of choice, his 
own destiny as relates to the next stage of his 
existence, or, the first plane of the Future ; and 
as he elects, so in that stage will be his destiny. 
If he chooses wisely, he will give up his Present 
with an assurance that he will have a "'part 
in the First Resurrection." 

If he persist in his refusal of Divine condi- 
tions, he must descend to his grave to remain 



DESTINY OF MAX S PRESENT. 



49 



holden of Death until raised to stand face to 
face with a just Judge, and receive such recom- 
pense as accords with the Will of God. He 
Who only can restore man's lost destiny has 
made His terms easy, as easy as for us to con- 
fess our fault to an injured neighbor 

He stood and cried aloud among the people 
He was laboring and suffering and dying to 
restore to the favor of His Father: "Come 
unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden 
and I will give you Rest ! Take my yoke upon 
you and learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly 
in heart ; and ye shall find Rest unto your 
souls ! For My yoke is easy and my Burden 
is Light !" 

Come then ! Come all ! and Come Now ! 

The history of ages of rebellion, of stubborn- 
ness, of want of even common gratitude, and 
perseverance in the ways of sin, is open before 
you in most vivid contrast ; and you are coun- 
selled to make the choice that will re-unite 
you to an unspeakably Glorious Destiny. 



4 



LIFE. 

Adam at his creation ''was made a living 
soul," and the principle of life belonging to 
him is dependent upon Revelation for its defi- 
nition. We are told there that God ' ' breathed 
into his nostrils the breath of life," and that 
he, the whole man, became a living soul, in the 
singular. No intention of conveying any idea 
of a duplicate being apparent in the text. 
Man's candidacy, according to Scripture, was 
subjected to a test of obedience, and we are 
plainly told in Genesis that he forfeited all 
right to immortality, which would seem impos- 
sible had man possessed in his being an innate 
endless existence. 

It is furthermore a Bible fact that the 
means ordained by the Creator to confer 
eternal life was forcibly kept from him, and 
that for the very reason of its existing object. 

Our argument, then, founded upon the 
above weighty premises, successfully disputes 
the Rabbinnical, and also the Platonic doc- 
trine of the immortality of the human soul. 



LIFE. 



5* 



For us we believe with St. Paul, that ' k God 
only hath immortality." That the attribute 
was not inherent or secured in Adam, and can 
only be gained in Christ. 

Shall we say that this crude being, whose 
appetites, whose passions and whose general 
natures are in common with the animals be- 
neath us, can lay valid claims to the chief at- 
tribute of the living God ? Think you that an 
immortal entity could inhabit this miserable, 
sin-scarred being, and hold no more potent in- 
fluence over it ? 

Who, of all the countless millions that have 
lived prior to this generation, save Enoch, 
Moses, Elijah and Jesus Christ, are alive to- 
day ? Enoch, who walked in the way with 
his God, and truthful, pure-minded and right- 
eous Elijah, have never been one moment un- 
der the dominion of death, and Moses and the 
"Prophet like unto" him, whom Moses fore- 
shadowed in his own death and resurrection, 
suffered the extreme penalty of the curse. 
God buried the one, and the other " made His 
grave with the rich in his death." God sent 
for the body of the one, and the king of ter- 
rors could not hold the other ? No, the other 



52 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



is ' 4 He that liveth and was dead ! and be- 
hold /" He is "alive for evermore. Amen! 
And hath the keys of hell and of death /" 

My friend, I am glad those keys are there. 
Do you not think it best to place your inter- 
ests, your hopes, your Life in the Conquering 
Hand that holds those keys ? 

On that death and on that resurrection de- 
pends our life, the assurance of which is all 
that pertains to our present. We shall go 
down to the grave, and we shall lie longer 
there than He did ; but if He hides our life 
with Himself in God, through our obedience, 
those keys will unlock our prison-house, and 
we shall again live in His Life, For He is the 
resurrection and the Life. 

Pardon me, reader, if I find it difficult to 
keep to the things that pertain to the present, 
for these are delectable mountains, and al- 
though we are a part of the present you can 
point me to the joy and the beauty, and the 
glory that seem to beckon to us from across 
the intervening valley. " Blessed and holy is 
he that hath part in the first ressurrection. " 

The life of man in his present, is still like 
Adam's, in candidacy. "This do" from 



LIFE. 



53 



Genesis to Revelation is the condition of life. 

The burden that the Friend of man would 
lay upon us is light. He desires us to consider 
our ways and to place our feet in better paths. 
He gives us a great deal for a very little, and 
the crowning gift is Eternal Life. Although 
error in regard to conflicting religious tenets 
may not stand in the way of anyone's salvation 
or even cloud the enjoyment of their hope, it 
nevertheless has its evil effects. He who 
teaches that man possesses an innate life, co- 
existent with his Maker, conflicts with the 
Word from which he draws his spiritual sus- 
tenance. He places the convert to that theory 
in a position tc set a lighter value upon the 
Bible doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. 
This is a very old error, and is held to with 
great tenacity. If the student of Bible theol- 
ogy will hold as valueless the dogmas and ten- 
ets of men, and will rest alone on the Word 
of God, he will surely discard the error and 
find himself in harmony with the truth. How 
very strange that, if there be an intelligent 
soul, not dependent on the body for its life, 
with fullest capacities for enjoyment or suffer- 
ing, so much importance is attached to the 
burial of the body. 



54 



MAN I PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



No place is assigned in Scripture to the 
patriarchs but the grave. The particulars of 
their last hours and their interment are told in 
feeling and solemn language, but there is no 
final home intimated but the dark, cold and 
quiet house which they inherited from Adam. 
They died and 4 'were gathered to their fath- 
ers," is the utmost limits to which the Bible 
carries them with reference to a continuance 
of life. Yes, they died ; and all of life died 
with them except the hope in the Abrahamic 
promise, seeing " afar off" the resurrection of 
the dead and the kingdom established before 
the "foundation of the world." In the 
Promise to the Woman, the Promise to Abra- 
ham, the Song of the Prophets, the burden of 
the mission of Jesus Christ, the burden of the 
unanswerable arguments of the Apostles of 
the Gospel, and the imagery of the beatific 
vision of the beloved disciple, not one shadow 
of a hint is given, even to the ancient heirs of 
the Promise, that they possessed a principle 
of innate life that would ascend to the throne 
of God at the moment their Present closed. 
It seems a presumptuous idea that, in an in- 
stant of time, the principal part of this dupli- 



LIFE. 



cate being should be ushered into the august 
presence of uncreated and sinless spirits and 
their Infinite Head, from whom Adam, with 
but one sin, hid himself, when that soul 
which had been joined to the part formed 
from the dust of the earth, had been the 
prime mover, the framer and leader in all the 
sins committed by the creature while living 
out his Present. Join to this the total silence 
of Revelation regarding any innate immortality 
of man, and, above all, the express declara- 
tion of the Bible in the history of his condi- 
tions of material being at his creation, to the 
effect that any hypothesis in respect to con- 
tinuance of life beyond the few days allotted 
in this Present is absolutely without support. 
And this ought to be, and is, abundant evi- 
dence of the total mortality of man. He was 
of the earth, earthy. 

To the Jewish Rabbins are accorded the 
doubtful credit of giving to the world the doc- 
trine of the immortality of the human soul. 
At what period it was first promulgated is not 
known ; and its total want of authority in the 
Pentateuch and the books of the prophets, of- 
fers the opinion that it was an offspring of 



56 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



their fertility in theologies, blended, perhaps, 
with a superstitious credence in posthumous 
apparitions. 

Reader, you are advised to suppose for a 
time that the Bible doctrine of Life does not 
certainly teach an innate immortality, carried 
over and beyond the grave into the presence 
of God and the " more than twelve legions of 
angels ;" and take up the subject upon its own 
bare merits, unbiassed by human commentary. 
Permit me to premise your results. You will 
find it to have been the one great object of the 
Creator, to plan for the creation of millions of 
intelligent beings for the sole purpose of 
making them supremely and endlessly happy. 

You will find that in the curse of the two 
progenitors of all the children of men, it was 
decreed that they should return to the primi- 
tive element from whence they were taken. 
You will find that not one word respecting so 
great a factor of man's being as an undying 
principle, was either spoken or shadowed. 

You will find there St. Paul's grounds for 
saying that "the first man is of the earth, 
earthy : the second man is the Lord from 
Heaven :" the first, being the type and condi- 



LIFE. 



57 



tion of all according to the flesh, and the 
second, to be the " door," the "way " and the 
44 life " itself. 

You will find that if the principal entity of 
man is praising God among His ministering 
spirits, those "that are fallen asleep in Christ 
are not perished," and that their life does not 
depend, as Paul contended, on the resurrec- 
tion of Christ from the dead. 

You will find many things in your progress 
through the Word of Life, which, stripped of 
the vesture of sectarian opinion will present 
an altogether new and different sense, and in 
many cases will stand in direct and actual con- 
tradiction to your pre-conceived views. Death 
instead of being "the gate of endless joy," 
will shrink back to its original purpose and 
become the curse of fallen man. In short, as 
regards the life question, you will be able to 
follow the easy lead from Adam to Moses, to 
Abraham, through the prophets, to the first 
coming of Christ, and on through the ministry 
of the apostles, across the borders of this 
present, into the thousand years awarded to 
those who have k k part in the first resurrection. " 

As long as you find the flowers by the way 



58 



MAN I PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



lovelier than you ever found elsewhere ; as 
long as the song of the birds beguile you into 
the belief that they are seraph's anthems ; as 
long as you seem to feel in the perfumed 
breezes the sweet influences of the Holy 
Spirit, the path will be a joyous one to you. 
And may you find for yourself, the way, and 
the door and the life. 

Pause at Mount Calvary and stay till " it is 
finished" stay until the last drop of the heal- 
ing fountain has trickled down the shaft of the 
cross, and the clear waters of life are typified 
by the colorless stream that flows from His 
side. Be sure that during the event most im- 
portant to man, while you note the climax of 
Jewish rage and hatred, and the cruel results 
of wresting the Scriptures to their own de- 
struction, while your eyes rain tears of sym- 
pathy and your heart overflows with contri- 
tion for the part you have acted, you pray him 
to remember you when He comes ' k in His 
kingdom." Take up then your cross, and 
through the rest of the way never be ashamed 
to be seen bearing it. 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE 
OF THIS AGE OF THE PRESENT. 

Before closing this part of our subject it is 
deemed proper to lay before the reader a gen- 
eral view of moral, social and governmental 
relations, as contrasted with an age taking for 
its rule of life the Gospel of Christ. 

Let us carefully compare things as they are, 
with what they should be, and note how far, 
as a whole, the world has gone out of the way. 

The tidings brought by the angel to the 
shepherds and rounded out by the accompany- 
ing choir was kk Peace on Earth" and kk Good 
Will to Men.' 1 

The history of all the wars related by sacred 
and profane authors, the heaps of slain, the 
throes of dying agony, the bereavement of 
father, mother, kindred and lover, and ail the 
dire evils consequent on 1 4 horrid war, " are the 
direct fruits of unbelief, and joined to all other 
sins, retard the coming of the millennial king- 
dom, in that they prevent the accomplishment 
of God's determined number. To make our 



6o 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



meaning better understood, had man kept his 
hands unstained by war, his numerical in- 
crease would have been greater, and the sin 
had not existed, and the kingdom of God had 
come nigher. For when the fore- ordained 
number is complete, the prophecy belonging 
to the present will be fulfilled, and present 
will be changed into future. 

Another powerful factor in the hindrance 
of the approaching reign of righteousness is 
intemperance, and more especially the use of 
alcoholic drinks. This dread evil is older 
than war, and is pictured on the earlier pages 
of the present. The disposition of man to 
seek out inventions and a perverted appetite 
placed in position, without doubt, the most 
powerful engine for the destruction of the 
race. 

Ye pitiable sufferers from this hideous curse, 
write the long list of its dead victims ; marshal 
its horrors of woe, want and misery in almost 
endless line, set in array the shattered intel- 
lects, the blighted hopes, the bedimmed pros- 
pects, the alienated affections, the ruined lives, 
the broken hearts and the horrors of retrospec- 
tion. Inventory the squalid poverty, the hun- 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 6 I 

ger, the nakedness, the blushes of abused vir- 
tue's holy sense of shame, the progress in sin 
until sacred virtue abdicates her throne in the 
heart of one of whom in a little earlier child- 
hood the Master declared, "of such is the 
Kingdom of Heaven." 

Summon the obscenity, profanity, the oaths 
and the blasphemies before you and count 
them. Conjure the falsehoods, the thefts, the 
gambling, the forgeries, the perjuries, the 
wrangles, the brawls, the robberies, and the 
murders, and then enumerate them. 

Enter the prisons and catalogue the list 
whom alcohol has incarcerated ; who are serv- 
ing out the penalty of outraged Justice, or are 
waiting for some fatal Friday to expiate on the 
shameful gallows, crimes instigated by a curse 
sanctioned by Laze. 

Seek out and tell the thousands of young 
men and boys who are in the incipient stages 
of the drunkard's career ! 

Find what is the sum of the skilled in the 
arts and sciences, the profound in logic and the 
deep in research ; men of high promise, edu- 
cated, cultured, refined, who are willing to 
dispossess noble Reason of the guidance of 



62 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



their lives in favor of the demon Rum ! Set 
up in hideous phalanx all those whom Rum 
has made maniacs, and who have themselves 
blown out the lamp of their own Present ! 
And while you survey with horror the spectacle, 
resolve in the depth of your soul, never to 
countenance the traffic or use of rum ! And 
you may safely say, had this state of things 
never existed, God's number would be nearer 
full, and His Kingdom nearer at hand. But 
the strong arm of the law is between the 
wretched inebriate and his reformation ; inter- 
poses between his suffering wife and the poorest 
necessities of life ; withholds bread, clothing, 
comfort, education and religious teaching from 
their children ; while the social verdict bars 
them from their place among the good and 
pure ; and, goaded to the verge of endurance 
they descend to the depths of sin and shame ! 
But the scales of God's justice weigh with nice 
distinction their sins and sufferings, and their 
Father in Heaven charges a heavy balance to 
the account of social pride and Godless law ! 

Ye stalwart champions of a holy cause 
whose thundering and soul-reaching eloquence 
has so often proclaimed the sin of drunken- 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 



63 



ness, the shamelessness of the traffic and the 
monstrous crime of its chief abettor, has 
"your labor indeed been in vain in the Lord ? 
Has your bread been cast upon the waters," 
to return in full cargoes " after many days." 
O y how many are the days ! 

Ye noble and untiring workers of the 
Woman's Christian Temperance Union, re- 
new your vow ! Gird on afresh your armour ! 
Make haste to the battle ! God has placed 
the sword of the Spirit, which is the sword of 
conquest, in your hands ! And with that irre- 
sistible weapon He bids you assail the for- 
tress of law ! March forth, then, to the 
mightiest victory that the annals of conflict 
have ever recorded ! Lay low the barriers 
that shut you from the ear of national law ! 
Demand the release of the prisoners of the 
tyrant ! Point in righteous anger to the de- 
based estate of your sisters ! Exhibit in mental 
photograph fathers, mothers, brothers, kindred, 
lovers and friends in the thraldom of the mon- 
ster ! Cast at the feet of the magnates of 
law the protest of every true woman in the 
land in the form of petition, asking in the 
name of humanity, of religion, of justice and 



64 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



of God, the right of suffrage in this one issue ! 
I believe firmly that to you Christian women 
of our country belongs the power and the suc- 
cess of sweeping from our land the greatest 
social and moral evil and the cruelest legal- 
ized sin that ever befell mankind in all their 
degeneracy. Ring in the ears of legislation, 
with a fervor and a persistency born of tre- 
mendous import : " Avenge me of mine ad- 
versary !" until the love of rum shall yield to 
your faithful importunity, and your effort be 
crowned with success and victory. And an 
admiring world will speedily follow your glo- 
rious lead, and the prayer, "Thy kingdem 
come," will be offered in stronger faith. War, 
with the constructive skill brought to bear in 
the production of deadly engines and factors, 
must necessarily eliminate itself, unless the 
powers of earth discard their use. For the 
armies of nations will, withbetterprotest than 
heretofore, refuse to sacrifice themselves in 
wars to which they deem so many lives para- 
mount considerations. 

We do not believe that the sins of man- 
kind do, or possibly can affect the Creator. 
The consequences of sin among the children 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 65 



of men fall upon themselves and their fellows. 
''Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth 
death." Death is the natural and inevitable 
consequence of sin. It is its result and final- 
ity, because the trend of sin is to weaken, de- 
moralize and reduce the physical being to its 
normal conditions of earthy element ; and 
this is death. Therefore we feel an assurance 
in offering the conclusion that the greatest 
sins are those that produce the greatest num- 
ber of deaths in the world. 

Passing over the lesser death-producing 
causes that exist, we will glance at the litera- 
ture of this age. With mammon for their 
deity and incentive, the writers of popular fic- 
tion have secured competence, amassed 
wealth and flooded the world with what the 
vitiated tastes of the masses have pronounced 
indispensable. Consider the many who never 
read anything but the sensational and imag- 
inative creations of celebrated writers of un- 
realities, who shed rivers of tears over the 
painted sufferings of some angelic hero or 
heroine whose eulogist and creator is the suc- 
cessful novelist Take into account the vast 
number of these lachrymose readers who never 
5 



66 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



shed a tear over the pathetic and real scenes 
and sufferings of the Man of Sorrows, and 
who from their childhood up to the hour when 
they were gathered in death, never read the 
Bible through. Permit me to tell you that 
if you will study the Book which is of more 
value to you than all other literature, with 
half the assiduity with which you pore over 
the imagery of fiction, you will be very likely 
to acquire a wholesome relish for something 
that will be of actual use to you, ?nd prove 
a literature that will pass review in the 
ordeal of Divine criticism. But it may not be 
contradicted, that there are works of fiction 
having for their object the desire to bring 
their readers nearer to the great issues belong- 
ing to the present and future. 

I shall not assume to condemn this class of 
literature, but may safely say that "from the 
beginning it was not so." I shall leave the is- 
sues of this question in the hands of Christian 
ethologists, promising to respect their verdict. 
It is the descent from pure and high Christian 
narrative, wherein moral and religious senti- 
ments were inculcated down to the poor level 
of earth-born affections that we should depre- 
cate. 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 6/ 



No reflections will be here cast upon any 
treatise on Platonic or pure human love, for 
their places are among the first moral consid- 
erations. And it is worth}' of note that in the 
years past many books have been given to the 
public of a decidedly religious character, car- 
rying* along with their narrative a fine thread of 
pure and Christian romance that has elicited a 
proper appreciation. But those works called 
for frequent reference to the Book of Books, 
and their writers either aimed at skepticism or 
had for their object the spiritual welfare of 
their readers. 

We will leave this topic after exhorting all 
novel readers to keep close to their best relig- 
ious interests by bounding their reading tastes 
and their earthly affections by the rules and 
precepts of the Scriptures, and not to suffer 
the record to be placed against them, that 
they have not read the Bible through. 
4 k Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think 
ye have eternal life, and they are they which 
testify of Me. " 

The grandeur and splendor of Solomon's 
temple has ever been the excuse for converting 
the money and treasure that should, bv the 



68 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Master's command, be used in supplying the 
wants of the widow and the fatherless, feeding 
the hungry and clothing the naked, into the 
palatial magnificence and costly appointments 
of modern church edifices. When Hiram, 
king of Tyre, out of friendship for King David, 
made the compact with Solomon for building 
material, the wise king was highly favored in 
the matter of cost. He made the proper levy 
on his own subjects for labor, and when 
finished it was the wonder of the world for 
beauty, richness and magnificence. At that 
particular time, under the righteous rule of a 
God-fearing king, the worshippers in that tem- 
ple were not carried away from their deep and 
true devotions by the glitter and glory of its 
unrivalled beauty or the marvels of its match- 
less workmanship, for the presence of the 
divine inhabitant was sufficient to chasten the 
worship of His votaries. 

It was not that magnificence of structure or 
expense in decoration was desired by Him for 
whom Solomon built the house, for he de- 
clares by the mouth of the martyr Stephen in 
his last words, quoted from the prophet : 
" Heaven is my throne, and earth is my foot- 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 69 



stool, what house will ye build me ? saith the 
Lord, or what is the place of my rest ? Hath 
not my hand made all these things ?" It ap- 
pears that, pleased with their zeal and alacrity 
in the work, at a time of unparalleled prosper- 
ity, and as a means of diverting the Jews from 
idolatrous worship and concentrating their de- 
votions on Himself, He permitted and encour- 
aged the building of that marvel of beauty, 
Solomon's temple. The temple in the days of 
our Savior, of which He prophesied that it 
should be thrown down so low that not one 
stone .should be left upomanother, was the last 
edifice for the worship of God that had any 
right to be built in magnificence of structure 
or extravagance in decorative appointments. 
Behold the humble Jesus of Nazareth dispens- 
ing the gospel of life upon the hillsides, on the 
sea shore and in the vessels belonging to the 
fishermen, and if He entered into the syna- 
gogues it was to perfectly expound a perverted 
law, or bring back from wrested Scriptures 
and prophecies, and make plain the tradition- 
clouded way of life, shadowed and foretold by 
them. And if He entered the gorgeous temple 
it was that the lion of the tribe of Judah might 



7o 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



beard the lions of a wicked and perverse priest- 
hood in their own kk den of thieves." 

Directly after the crucifixion behold the 
church of Christ scattered and wandering from 
place to place, shut oat from the temple, cast 
out of the synagogues, gathering by dint of 
persistent preaching and their strong faith, 
the humble and the poor, who, all told, could 
not have raised the funds with which to build 
and decorate one of our modern houses of 
worship. The meager funds they solicited 
found their way through the channels of Holy 
Charity to the needs of the poor within their 
Christian circle, who were never taxed to raise 
towering steeples, costly bells, rich carpets or 
expensively cushioned seats. 

My friends, could Paul have carried in cur- 
rent coin, bearing on its face the " image and 
superscription of Caesar,'' the value of one 
modern church's superfluous appointments 
and decorations, what a relief the gift would 
have been to the "poor saints at Jerusalem." 
And if the millions of treasure expended in 
useless and unchristian vanities that make so 
large apart in the temples of worship to-day 
could be expended in the holy purposes of the 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE ~ I 



Divine Master, the poor could indeed have the 
gospel preached to them, clothed in raiment 
that culpable fashion and a Godless social 
system would not feel an unchristian sense of 
shame in listening" to the words of life beside 
them. Had St. Paul been dressed after the 
manner of our day's clergy, it is doubtful if he 
would have burdened Timothy with the cloak 
he left at Troas. 

Daughter of Zion, turn to the third chapter 
of Isaiah and see if you do not behold your- 
selves mirrowed in some of its verses. 

We may not borrow from Solomon's age the 
furnishings of his temple, the bejewelled and 
gaudy dress of its priesthood, or the costly ex- 
travagance and pomp of its worship, for they 
in no manner comport with the unassuming 
dignity of the high calling of the humble fol- 
lowers of our Lord and Master. 

Every cent expended in vain ornamentation 
or superfluous luxury, and from that to the 
millions lying beyond the reach of God's poor, 
will, when we face the results, speak to us 
through lips that ever pleaded for the poor, 
the sentence expressed more than eighteen 
hundred years ago, and which has lain on the 



72 MAN: PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



sacred page in vivid characters : ' ' Inasmuch 
as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye 
did it not to Me :" while we offer as our only 
palliation: "O, we loved the frivolous vanities 
of the earthly life more than we did these Thy 
poor brethren." 

If the Savior required the rich young man 
to sell his possessions and give the proceeds 
to the poor, will not as much of that require- 
ment hold good as would oblige us to dispense 
the purchase money of needless and unbecom- 
ing ornament in behalf of the needy ? Imagine 
the dress of the Son of Man, could you fancy 
a 4 'gold ring" or costly clothing ? In short, 
could the picture represent Him in the cos- 
tume of the clergyman who preached to you 
last Sunday ? He wore no frivolities and He 
tolerated none. He was our pattern in these 
matters as well as in those of spiritual things. 
No disciple down to the universal or Romish 
church were permitted to wear extravagances 
whose value was of need among the poor. 

If it be claimed that God not only permit- 
ted but ordered the varied decorations of the 
Mosaic tabernacle, the Ark of the Covenant, 
breastplates, &c, it will of course be conced- 



MORAL,. SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 73 



ed. But that will offer no extenuating plea, 
for the heathen about them employed in their 
worship a vast amount of glitter and pagean- 
try, and it was necessary that this should be 
outdone in order to present attractions to keep 
a frivolous nation from idolatry. 

There is none of pageantry or jewelry or 
4k outward adorning'' necessary in the humble 
religion of Jesus Christ, and you are counseled 
to sit down and mentally sort out the things 
not consistent with a humble walk in the Way 
and discard them, for they are the weights 
that so easily beset us. Let us buy with our 
money only the things we need, and we will 
then possess the means to fulfill the righteous 
precepts of the friend of the poor. For 
adornment let us buy of Him ' k gold tried in 
the fire, and white raiment/' that we " may 
be clothed." Then when the nations bring 
their treasures of kt glory and honor" into the 
Holy City, we may be found rich in true 
wealth and clothed in the k k wedding garment " 
when we sit down to the eternal feast and the 
Master drinks with us of the new wine in His 
Father's Kingdom. 

I desire to place before the reader the prin- 



74 MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



cipal causes of apathy in regard to repentance, 
reform and an interest in the important con- 
cerns of the present and future. To those 
who have accepted the grace of Christ and 
possess the earnest of their inheritance in 
their consolation, that seemingly total care- 
lessness and indifference on the subject ap- 
pears absolutely unaccountable. For the 
apathetic the Christian draws anew the plan 
of their salvation : he appeals to them in 
fervent exhortation to give the subject a can- 
did and serious consideration, he lays before 
them their inexcusable and base ingratitude 
in refusing to respond to the love of their best 
and truest friend. He contrasts the condi- 
tion and prospects in this life of those in and 
out of Christ. He paints in glowing colors, 
as his convictions in relation to a future state 
may be, the ruin of the finally impenitent, or 
the bliss of the redeemed, and with an elo- 
quence inspired by the momentous import of 
the subject to them, entreats them to yield to 
the love without a parallel. But the listener re- 
mains apathetic and unmoved. The subject 
in treatment and application is, to him, stale. 
It is not sufficiently sensational. His heart 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. 75 

has become callous by reading emotional lit- 
erature. Or the god of this world exhibits for 
him greater attractions. Or conflicting sec- 
tarian renderings of the Scriptures have made 
him skeptical. Or, in his opinion, the authen- 
ticity of the Bible has not been conclusively 
established. Will you please set aside, for 
the time, these and all other causes which 
conspire to produce this apathy, and read 
your Bible through very carefully and, as you 
progress, collect all its not very varied sub- 
jects and, rejecting human commentary, com- 
pare Scripture with Scripture and spiritual 
things with spiritual ? I think I can safely 
promise you that your interest will be awak- 
ened and your apathy gone. 

The day in our present has come, when 
Christians seem on the verge of unity ; when 
they are more willing to count as valueless the 
differences that have so long stood in the way 
of perfect brotherhood, and with which the 
Word of God had nothing to do ; when Jesus 
Christ and His Cross will be the rallying point 
and center of all Christian denominations ; 
when Christ and Him crucified will be con- 
sidered abundantly sufficient for the salvation 



7 6 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



of men, without sectarian or academic the- 
ologies. 

In many places there have arisen unosten- 
tatious but comfortable edifices where Chris- 
tians of every name may worship the Lord their 
God ; and it is your testimony that in no 
other places have you enjoyed so much of re- 
ligious freedom. 

The union of christian effort in revival work 
touches the heart of the sinner and draws 
largely on the influences of the Holy Spirit. 
You who have more money than you can con- 
scientiously spend, buy the real estate, erect a 
plain but commodious building without steeple, 
without belfry and without extravagance in 
outline or detail, and present it as a free-will 
offering to your community. Call upon the 
shepherds of all flocks to dispense the gospel 
of free grace-— free in every sense, in the free 
sanctuary, whose ' 4 builder and maker " is your- 
self. Then indeed will you have made "to 
yourself friends of the mammon of unright- 
eousness," when the frequenters of that chapel 
shall point toward you and say : " He loveth 
our nation and hath built us a synagogue !" 

Professed followers of Jesus Christ who pride 



MORAL, SOCIAL AND SECULAR STATE. J~ 

yourselves on belonging to the higher circles 
of society, but whose claim the Master never 
did nor ever will countenance, divest your- 
selves of every shred of the ungodly idea of 
social caste and receive the poorest and hum- 
blest brother on the christian footing of equal- 
ity, and let the Master — and not you, weigh 
the difference between you. How can you 
defer this plain duty ? 1 1 Hath not God chosen 
the poor of this world, rich in faith and heirs 
of the Kingdom ?" Is it as true of us to-day 
as it was when James wrote his general epistle, 
"that we have despised the poor ? If ye have 
respect to persons ye commit sin /" Does there 
kk come unto your assembly a man with a gold 
ring in goodly apparel ?" and does there follow 
at a respectful distance "a poor man in vile 
raiment ?" And do you have respect to the 
man in 1 1 gay clothing " and give him a seat in 
a k k good place " ? while the poor man is bidden 
to stand up or sit in a place where he will pre- 
sent the greatest possible contrast to your own 
social position ? Verily this is the condition 
of the professed disciples of Him who said all 
He could say in disapproval of sue// a Social 
Evil ! Verily this is the Laodicean state pict- 



78 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



ured by the Revelator. And faith without 
works has brought upon us this social disease, 
which, like all diseases, must have their causes 
removed before a cure can be effected. 
" Ye cannot serve God and Mammon !" 



THE END OF THE PRESENT. 



Adam and Eve, and every offspring that has 
succeeded them, have in their day been ready, 
fit and prepared for the Kingdom of Heaven. 
They have all been what the Master would 
have the children of the kingdom to be. They 
are set on their feet in the Present, sinless and 
pure. Not one taint of original sin, or even 
the latent fearful legacy inherited from wicked 
progenitors, has effaced God's glorious image. 
Where among all the poets, the painters and 
sculptors, where among all the fond fancies 
and imageries in the mother heart, called up 
by her love and by the purity, the beauty and 
entire loveliness of her little child, has the 
perfect meed been so well awarded as in those 
memorable words in Luke 18:16. 

It is a beautiful thought that all the little 
children will hear the rustle of the heavenly 
wings in the dark grave where their loving- 
friend has prepared their bed and laid them 
to sleep in Him — for ki He giveth His beloved 
sleep," and shall come forth in childlike j o 



8o 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



to be again taken in His loving arms and be 
recognized as part of the kingdom at hand. 

And this was our estate at one time. None 
living may complain that the Creator gave 
him not a fair start on the journey of life. 
But evil example, evil precept and evil sur- 
roundings have brought us into subjection to 
the powers of this world. 

The agency of the little child cannot affect 
its condition until its accountability is devel- 
oped, and on the instant in which that tran- 
spires, if it choose the better part, no matter 
how crude are its ideas, no matter how feeble 
its faith, it will glisten among His "jewels" 
when He makes them up. The test of a 
child's accountability may not be made upon 
its infantile sense of right and wrong. Ad- 
am's responsibility came not to him until in 
his agency he was deemed competent to make 
his choice. So with the child ; and from the 
sure conclusions involved in the above facts, 
our Savior gave us the gracious words : ' 4 Seek 
Me early andj/<? shall find Me." 

Let us note the fact that in the innocent 
heart of the little child there is no place for 
sectarian theories or doctrines of men. 



THE END OF THE PRESENT. Si 

O teach your child through the sweet influ- 
ences of parental love to follow the story of 
the babe in the manger, His obedience in 
childhood, His baptism in Jordan, how He 
healed the ailing and raised the dead, how He 
regarded the beauty of flowers and the purity 
of little children, how He taught the simple 
and plain truth and warned men against error ; 
how He taught His followers to pray ; how, on 
account of their sins and the sins of the 
world, He gave His life for the children of 
men ; how He was abused and mocked and 
scourged and led away to Calvary and nailed 
with great spikes to the cross, and pierced 
with a spear, and how His blood washes away 
the sins of mankind, how He manifested His 
power and divine nature by rising from His 
grave and ascending to His Father in Heaven, 
and how He loves them there, as well as 
when He was here, and is waiting for the 
time to come when He will call them too 
from their graves and fold them in His arms 
again. Teach them to love Him and give 
Him their hearts and obey Him in this life, 
and that He will be their joy and their life in 
the world to come. The child's sympathies 
6 



82 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



will be touched, its interest awakened, its 
grateful love kindled, and it will seek its 
Savior early and will find Him ! 

But father, and mother, would you in these 
lessons feel a sort of disgust over what you 
call ' 4 cant," and withhold the teachings? If 
so, you are advised to review and consider your 
own situation, remembering that your child is 
dependent on you for early instruction, and for 
its advantages. Since the world began it has 
ever been thus. Millions of men and women 
have left the high estate of child-like purity 
and come down to the end of their present 
without any interest in a coming future. And 
so it will continue to be till the hour when 
God's number shall be full ; until He whose 
right it is, takes the kingdom ; until man's 
agency and accountability shall be taken from 
him and he sins no more ; until He reveals the 
lives hidden with Him in God, until the trum- 
pet calls from their graves the subjects of His 
kingdom ; and He comes ' ' to His own and His 
own " receives' Him. 



THE FUTURE. 



INTERMEDIATE. 

"Man dieth and wasteth away: Yea, man giveth up 
the ghost, and where is he?" 

We assume that the intermediate state of 
the "dead in Christ " has its bounds within 
what we have denominated the present ; and 
have also considered man's individual present 
as closing with his life ; and as so large a num- 
ber of the dead remain in their graves after the 
first resurrection ; until the first stage of the 
future has passed ; we shall treat job's ques- 
tion as belonging to the future. " Where is 
he ?" and what is he ? after living out the few 
days that make the sum of his existence here, 
are inquiries that have taxed the profoundest 
study, the most laborious research and the 
broadest thought. It has raised multitudes 
of hypotheses, and drawn innumerable conclu- 
sions, and in most of them there is lacking the 
element of sound logic ; for in no case may 
man contradict the express declaration of Him 



8 4 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



who knows best of all the purposes in man's 
creation, the elements that were employed in 
his formation, how to so apply the principle of 
life to inert matter as to produce a living, 
thinking and intelligent being ; who knew best 
of all and who cn]y knows the process by 
which man returns to primitive matter, and 
who only knows how to answer the question 
before us. 

It is not the design here to summon the long- 
list of witnesses in support of the facts regard- 
ing this issue. There are from one to half a 
dozen Bibles in almost every house in the land, 
and in them are recorded these plain and sure 
testimonies ; to which, as in duty bound, I 
earnestly refer you. 

The principal object throughout this little 
work will be to induce you to take up the 
Scriptures, and with strong purpose seek out 
all it contains that is intended for your instruc- 
tion and general good. And permit me to say 
to you that the contradictions of man-made 
theology are not chargeable to the Bible ; and 
to advise that you do not make any effort to 
reconcile them to the text of the Word of 
Life. It does not require a highly educated 



THE FUTURE. 



85 



reader to demonstrate this fact to his satisfac- 
tion 

Job, in his prosperity, had enjoyed life in an 
eminent degree. Surrounded by all that 
riches could confer, he was the bountiful 
steward of his Gods temporal blessings. 
Happy in the approval of heaven, blest in his 
family and in the friendship of a large circle of 
admiring acquaintances, he stood in the gates 
and waited for the naked, that he might clothe 
them ; for the hungry, that he might feed 
them ; for the oppressed, that he might plead 
their cause and right their wrongs ; for the 
widow, that he might dispel the shadows of 
want ; for the fatherless, that they might find 
in him a father ; for the lame and the blind, 
that he might be their helper ; for the sick 
and the afflicted, that he might minister unto 
them. And these were indeed the chief 
sources of his happiness. The balance of 
blessing in favor of the giver ! 

It is not strange, then, that in his sore af- 
fliction Job should utter in bewildered aston- 
ishment his complaint and protest. He fol- 
lows fris prospective sufferings down to the 
hour and act of death, and in the climax of his 



86 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



grief asks the great question under our consid- 
eration : ' 4 Where is he ?" and what is he ? 
The unbeliever, ever ready with a response, 
answers 44 Nowhere." And to our other and 
kindred query, "Nothing." He will tell you 
that the material elements of the earth are 
eternal, but that the portion of them which 
were formed into that living, breathing and 
wonderful being, man, can possess no other 
eternity of existence than that common to the 
general volume. 

Do not believe him ! For while he proves 
by clouds of scientific argument to his own 
satisfaction the ridiculous impossibility of a 
re-animation of a creature who had gone back 
to his primitive particles, all his science and 
philosophy must fail to touch the fact that 
every representative of that dust had once 
stood upon its feet a living, breathing and in- 
telligent man ! Then, reader, you may ask 
him : " Why should it be thought a thing 
incredible with you that God sliould raise the 
dead?" 

Whoever demonstrates a miracle by science 
works another. There is more of miracle 
in many things which we see about us than 
human philosophy can explain. 



THE FUTURE. 



87 



There is no doubt that infinite wisdom is be- 
yond the comprehension of finite knowledge, 
however high the pride of human intellect may 
aspire. 

Metaphysics is the ante-room of infinity, 
lighted only by the dim rays from the lamp of 
speculative philosphy, and until the fervid 
gleams of light through the door to eternity 
illumine its gloom no finite mind may hope to 
secure its secrets. 

There is no more of miracle in the re-ani- 
mation of the dead than in their original crea- 
tion or in the reproduction of the human 
species. 

Man, since his creation, has progressed in 
knowledge and his researches do not end — but 
are only suspended at his death. ' k The dead 
know not any thing." This declaration will 
be found to be abundantly borne out through 
all the Bible wherever the subject is treated. 
And this ought to be 4k the conclusion of the 
whole matter." To assume, then, in the face 
of the express reading of Revelation — in direct 
contradiction of the Word of Life, that man 
possesses an imperishable entity, independent 
of his material composition, and which is arro- 



88 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



gantly claimed to be a direct part of the Cre- 
ator ; and that this eternal principle was 
breathed into his nostrils when his formation 
was accomplished, is to pervert the testimony 
of sacred writ, to teach man-made opinions 
for doctrine and to detract from the well es- 
tablished beauty and importance of the gospel 
of the Resurrection. Please to note as you 
study your Bible, that if God at man's crea- 
tion had 4 4 breathed into his nostrils" a living 
eternal principle, He would have placed him 
in the exact position — to prevent which, access 
to the tree of life was refused him. The qual- 
ity of his being would have been such that the 
death of his ' 'earthy" could not be the fulfill- 
ment of the curse. The case stand thus : The 
man ate of the forbidden tree, in disobedience 
of the command, and by that act has, for a 
time determined, frustrated the design and 
object in his creation, and entailed the conse- 
quences of his sin upon all succeeding genera- 
tions. If, while under these conditions he 
partake of the tree of Life of which he, when 
placed in the garden, was permitted to ' i freely 
eat," an eternity of existence under the same 
conditions would be acquired, and that error 



THE FUTURE, 



89 



of all errors, that sum of all cruelty, that dis- 
grace to the attributes of the Creator and to 
human intelligence, that vindictive, savage and 
more than brutal charge against Omnipotence; 
the long cherished but revolting, the long- 
preached but shamefully kk false doctrine " of 
most intense but hopeless, insufferable but 
remediless eternal fiery torments would not 
even then have been true, nor one shade of so 
fearful a gospel cloud one feature of God's 
grand design in our destiny. 

Note in your studious progress through the 
Word the vast stretch of difference between 
the wild, perverse and totally unsustained 
teachings of clerical dogmas and scholastic 
theologies, and the Truth as given in Reve- 
lation. 

The doctrine of the immortality of the soul 
is therefore the parent of the most hideous 
monster in all the creeds of Christianity, or in 
all the diversified teachings of heathenism. 

But hold ! Look over and beyond the dire 
debris of the traditions of men, and the ''doc- 
trines of devils," and behold "Life and Im- 
mortality" brought to light through the 
gospel ! 



go 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Carefully trace this sublime theme from 
Genesis to Revelation and strengthen your 
faith in the promises, brighten your lives as 
Christians and joyfully exhibit the Pearl you 
have purchased. 

The reasonable idea that God considered it 
needful to reduce man, in consequence of his 
fall, to the condition of his primitive elements 
by his death and "wasting away, "that He 
could in his second stage of being, according 
to His purpose, endow him with a second and 
more perfect life, may perhaps belong to the 
realms of speculative theology, but it carries 
with it the fact that such w 7 as the exact means 
employed. 

Then, after the provision of the "Lamb 
slain from the foundation of the world," the 
climax of the curse — death — was the first step 
toward man's resurrection, and toward undo- 
ing the evils his disobedience had brought upon 
him, furnishing us with uncontrovertible evi- 
dence of the single entity of man "That 
which thou sowest is not quickened except it 
die." Paul, in his similitude, proposes to bring 
no living imperishable germ from the court of 
heaven to aid in the resurrection of the '* body 



THE FUTURE. 



91 



that shall be," knowing well, as he did, that 
a hope in Christ is the Christian voucher, 
and knowing well that the buried kernel will 
germinate. 

4i Man dieth " in every case in accordance 
with the relative laws of his being. In this 
sense, ever since the fall, natural causes have 
produced natural consequences. Experi- 
mental and scientific efforts are constantly be- 
ing employed to produce the results that trans- 
pired only by a touch of the hem of the Mas- 
ter's garment, who, to leave on record evi- 
dences of His divinity, suspended the natural 
law, that He might employ the Divine Power. 
But human skill and effort are in vain. 
Fainter grows the pulse, shorter grows the 
breath, and the glazing eyes turn a farewell on 
weeping partner and distracted children. A 
few spasmodic gasps and the sufferer is gone. 
His obsequies are celebrated in tears, and his 
body is borne to the open grave and hidden 
from our sight. He kk wasteth away." The 
elements of his own decomposition are within 
him, for he is ' sown in corruption." In pro- 
cess of time he k 4 returns " to dust. In sight 
of all these things we can not but pronounce 



92 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



the being that once in the hands of his Maker 
became "a living soul ": Wholly Mortal ! 
But richest thought in the train ! If the mu- 
tual confession has passed between our buried 
brother and the Master, the elements of a new 
and deathless life are also sown with him, for 
he ' * died in faith !" 

How do these plain, consistent and reason- 
able teachings of God's word comport with the 
conflicting ' 'traditions of men"? How can 
men ignore these truths and declare that 
heaven, the throne room of the Almighty, is 
the gathering place of immortal entities, when 
in reality they live only in the imaginings of 
those who, not satisfied with the humble es- 
tate of man in the life and death of his pres- 
ent, accord to him the life attribute of the 
eternal : 4 4 If Christ be not raised, then they 
which are fallen asleep in Christ are per- 
ished. " 

Paul believed that sleep was the intermedi- 
ate condition of all who die. He believed 
that the future life of all men depended on the 
resurrection of Christ. He taught no immor- 
tality of any part of man in Heaven. He 
taught no eternal existence of any part of 



THE FUTURE. 



93 



man in the cruel hell of orthodoxy. He made 
faith in Jesus Christ the condition of uninter- 
rupted life and unutterable bliss. And it is 
with joyous hope that we fall asleep in Christ, 
to awaken in ' ' His likeness. " Let us all ' ' lay 
hold on the hope set before us " that, in the 
event of death, we may hear the sweetly 
whispered words: "Sleep, child of the 
Promise ; I am the Resurrection and the 
Life." 



THE FIRST RESURRECTION. 



It has always seemed to me that Job's ques- 
tion, " If a man die shall he live again ?" was 
asked in anxiety and uncertainty. We must 
depend upon Revelation for the solution of 
this most important problem; at the same time 
aided, perhaps, by relevant theories foundpar- 
allel with Bible evidence. Every human be- 
ing who has ' ' borne the image of the earthy 
shall also bear the image of the heavenly." 

Everybody that has, or will yet be ' ' sown 
in corruption," shall be "raised in incorrup- 
tion." Every "little child," whether of Jew 
or gentile, of pagan or Christian, of bond or 
free, of all climes and nations in this great 
world, who have left the stage of their Present 
and have gone to sleep in the Master's arms 
will hear His voice and come at His call : in- 
numerable in multitude, radiant in beauty 
and peerless in purity. What marvel, then, 
that our Savior should, in the streets of Jeru- 
salem, cast His eyes upon this richest of all 
scenes and say : Of such is the Kingdom of 



THE FIRST RESURRECTION. 



95 



Heaven ? What marvel that He loved them, 
and that He folded them to His heart and en- 
joyed a foretaste of the first resurrection ? 

It is a sweet thought that when the grave 
gives up its dead, parental and filial love will 
draw parent and child, brother and sister to- 
gether in joyous recognition. Every far-off 
gentile, every son and daughter of Israel, 
every child of Adam save Enoch, Melchise- 
dek, Moses and Elijah and those who 4 4 are 
alive and remain shall all be made alive !" 

Suddenly, at a time when the children of 
men are busiest in gathering the fleeting and 
fading vanities of earth ; suddenly, when they 
are buying, selling, building, adorning, "mar- 
rying and giving in marriage ;" suddenly, 
when the throne of mammon seems securest, 
"the times and seasons which the Father 
hath put in His own power " will have arrived, 
and the trump of the archangel shall awaken 
those who sleep in Christ, shall change the 
living Christian and the dead saint, the right- 
eous of the law and the gentile in the faith 
into the likeness of the glorious body. 

But while the one is being 44 taken and the 
other left"; while those who have the sign and 



9 6 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



seal of Christ's ownership are hovering with 
Him over the change necessary for the " res- 
titution of all things," the final installment of 
the " wages of sin" will be paid to all who 
chose death rather than life. God's number 
is full, and in the Revelator's idea was beyond 
human power to enumerate. This multitude 
of multitudes is awaiting the coronation of the 
Prince of David's kingly house ! Is witness- 
ing the entrance of Abraham into his promised 
possessions. O ye! the "thrust out," take 
with you your base ingratitude, your refusal to 
close with tireless offers of life ; take with you 
all the wickedness wherein ye gloried ; all the 
vain pomp and splendor of ' ' the former things " 
— take them with you and hide with them be- 
neath the dark shadows of death, until a man- 
date ye cannot disobey, summons and arraigns 
you for judgment. In concluding this branch 
of our subject, permit me to suggest a very 
reasonable supposition. Let us present the 
case just as it stands. If it were known that 
within forty days all the foregoing scenes would 
transpire, would you still be as unconcerned 
as now ! Would the exhortations, the en- 
treaties, the pleadings of those who are so 



THE FIRST RESURRECTION. 



97 



much more interested in your well-being than 
are yourselves, fall as to-day so fruitless at 
your feet ? Would the words, atonement, 
blood, repentance, forgiveness, conversion, 
faith, hope, love, cross and salvation furnish 
you with as much material for ridicule or dis- 
gust as now ? Or suppose the time be set at 
forty years ; would not those years be spent to 
better purpose than now ? The truth remains 
the same, reader, though that day were 
placed forty centuries in the future! ''Be- 
cause sentence against an evil work is not ex- 
ecuted speedily, therefore the heart of the sons 
of men is fully set in them to do evil." 

If you will look upon this matter in the 
light of utter selfishness, you are reminded 
that, though forty days and forty years may 
be allotted you ; not one hour of that time is 
assured you. 

1 k Though a sinner do evil an hundred times 
and his days be prolonged ; yet surely I know 
that it shall be well with them that fear God." 
" Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the 
first resurrection. On such the second death 
hath no power, but they shall be priests of 
God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him 
a Thousand Years !" 7 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



Who may essay the portrayal of the in- 
nocence and happiness of Adam and Eve, and 
their multiplying progeny in their Eden home 
under the conditions of obedience ? We may 
theorize and speculate, we may call to our aid 
all the fair imagery which the finite mind 
can picture, and fail. In no other manner can 
the boundless love of the Creator toward the 
creature be illustrated than in the glorious 
realities of the millennial age. Here we find 
the fallen raised, the lost restored, the dis- 
honored image glorified, the ' ' natural body " 
whose life depended on the conditions of ma- 
terial organism, warmed and animated and 
alert with the current that flows from the 
fountain of life. Here is restored to man his 
primitive candidacy, his obedience not ex- 
acted, because his accountability was buried 
and lost with his sinnership in his death. We 
find his feet established in the paths that 
surely lead to the tree of life. Here stand in 
living green the shapely trees of God's garden, 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



99 



and among them, with the elements of death, 
the consciousness of evil and divine prohibi- 
tion taken away, the tree of knowledge, of 
good and evil. Here in full and ceaseless 
fruitage they yield luxurious and refreshing 
aliment for bodies possessing the highest capa- 
bilities of enjoyment, but never hunger. 

In the original Eden the birds of the air, the 
beasts of the field and all the creeping things 
were partakers of the Creator's boundless 
bounty, and fed on food common to all liv- 
ing. If they, like mankind, were given life, 
and if in them God's purpose was progression 
of being, or if He made them to fulfill the 
good pleasure of His will, may we not hope to 
find them in the restitution of all things ? 
' ' which God hath spoken by the mouth of all 
His holy prophets since the world began." 

But no student of the starry skies may es- 
say to tell us which world among its millions 
shall be their home. 

Here are those lovely legacies of primitive 
Eden, the flowers ! through whose aroma and 
beauty we have so often worshipped their 
Creator ; of whom a lover of flowers once 
said : " Solomon in all his glory was not ar- 
rayed like one of these." 



IOO 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Here, because we shall know as w 7 e are 
known, we shall meet and greet those we 
loved in the earthly life, who have chosen the 
better part, and with them ascribe glory and 
honor to Him who is the prince of so great a 
salvation. 

Who is this on whom all eyes are turned ? 
with a princely bearing and a beauty inde- 
scribable ? Is this He who came from Edom ? 
with dyed garments from Bozrah ? Whose 
apparel is glorious ? On whose kingly brow 
sits the coronal of majesty, and in whose hand 
is the scepter of righteousness and peace ? 
Who is this that cometh with flying feet and 
outstretched arms, face radiant with the joy 
of glad recognition. Listen ! as an avenue is 
opened to the throned central figure there 
arises in subdued but eager tones the benison : 
" Blessed art thou among women ! and as she 
nears the feet of Him she once sought sorrow- 
ing — see ! the scepter lowers, and the con- 
queror's smile brightened by holy filial love as 
He repeats the last words He uttered to her, 
" Woman, behold thy son !" 

A group stands around the brilliant throne 
waiting till one of their number is released 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



IOI 



from the embrace of the Prince, between 
whom and the one whose head is pillowed on 
His bosom, seems to exist a strong bond of 
affection. It is John, the beloved disciple, 
and the waiting ones are Peter, James and 
the other disciples, who now behold the teach- 
ings and prophecies fulfilled in Him. They 
remember the mount of transfiguration, and 
Peter sees with joy the tabernacles which his 
random advice once proposed. There are 
Mary and Martha and their brother, whose 
greetings tell us of the love they bore each 
other in the old life. There are those who in 
faith received the word through the teachings, 
the examples and the miracles of the Master. 
There are the millions, who through the 
preached gospel have washed their garments 
in the fountain at the cross, and now with 
jubilant voice join in the mighty chorus : 
" Worthy the Lamb /" And where are y on 
and I ? There is a multitude in an ecstacy 
of delight, for the least and the last of the 
apostles has just told the interested crowd to 
wait until the stage on which they have just 
entered shall have prepared them to behold 
the face of the Father ; shall have made 



102 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



them all they would have been but for diso- 
bedience, and shall have made them through 
faith in the Prince and obedience to the gos- 
pel, fit to be partakers of the tree of life. He 
has told them that at that time all who are 
yet under the dominion of death will be raised 
with incorruptible bodies, and that then the 
return of the rebellious children of Jacob will 
begin. He has told them that an highway 
will be there, a way that the prophets called 
the way of holiness, in which wayfaring men, 
though fools, shall not err ; that the redeemed 
shall walk there, and the ransomed of the 
Lord shall return and come to Zion with ever- 
lasting joy upon their heads ; that they shall 
obtain joy and gladness, and that sorrow and 
sighing shall flee away. He tells them that 
one of the prophecies of the Prince is fulfilled 
before their eyes, for the meek do inherit the 
earth ; that of the increase of the government 
and peace of this kingdom there shall be no 
end. Here, saith he, ye who w 7 ere aforetime 
weary and heavy laden is your rest ! Now 
hath He who carrieth the keys of death and 
hell unlocked the gates of the grave for you, 
and like Him ye are alive forevermore. 4 ' It 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



103 



is," saith he, k k with joy that I stand here 
this day and behold the fruits of mine apostle- 
ship ! It is with joy that we can triumphantly 
shout k Death ' to us is swallowed up in vic- 
tory ! O death where is thy sting ? O grave 
where is thy victory ? Thanks be to God, 
who giveth us the victory through our Lord 
Jesus Christ ! And songs and loud anthems 
of praise to Him in whom all shall be made 
alive !" 

Isaiah with radiant mien arises and with his 
fervid eloquence and rapt imagery proclaims 
the fulfillment of his inspired prophecies. * k In 
the days of Ahaz, King of Judah," saith he, 
" the Lord sent me unto that wicked Prince, 
saying : k ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God ; 
ask it either in the depth, or in the height 
above.' But Ahaz said: k I will not ask/ 
Then the Lord gave Israel a sign ; k Behold a 
virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall 
call His name Immanuel. ' Behold the Virgin's 
Son ! Behold God with us ! Yea unto us a 
C In Id was born; and unto us a Son was given ; 
and the government is upon His shoulder; 
and His name is Wonderful, Counselor ; the 
Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the 



104 MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Prince of Peace.' 'Of the increase of His 
government and peace, there shall be no end, 
upon the throne whereon He reigneth, to order 
and establish it with judgment and with jus- 
tice from henceforth, even forever.' For the 
days are yet to come, w r hen 4 the mountains 
shall depart and the hills shall be removed ; 
and not then shall the covenant of the Lord's 
peace be removed. The foundations of Israel's 
habitation shall be laid with sapphires, and all 
his children shall be taught of the Lord.' For 
by my mouth the God of Jacob hath revealed 
unto Israel the punishments for his sins, and 
His blessings when they shall be accomplished. 
And in that day an ensign shall stand for the 
people, and the Gentiles shall seek unto it, 
and the rest shall be glorious. Thus saith the 
Lord God : ' Behold I will lift up mine hand 
to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the 
people, and they shall bring thy sons in their 
arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon 
their shoulders.' Break forth into song ye 
saints of God who through the dispensation of 
Moses saw shadowed forth the final sacrifice ! 
Who, in the promise to Abraham, saw your 
sure hope ! Who accepted the Messiah in 



A THOUSAND YEARS 



105 



His humiliation ; by which faith ye are this day 
partakers of His glory ! Who consented not 
unto those who, by wresting the Scriptures, 
made the promises of God of none effect unto 
themselves. Sing the glad anthem : Worthy 
the Lamb who was slain, ye who carried 
His cross to the borders of your graves in firm 
and true faith in Christ and Him crucified ! 
Who looked unto Him as the Author, but 
who is now become the Finisher of your 
faith ! Yea, sing the glad song of Moses 
and the Lamb, all ye His people, saying : 
4 Great and marvelous are Thy works, Lord 
God Almighty ; just and true are Thy ways, 
Thou King of Saints. Who shall not 
fear before thee, O Lord, and glorify 
Thy Name, for Thou only art Holy ! 
For all nations shall come and worship before 
thee for thy judgments are made manifest.'" 
1 1 Rejoice that ye can look with sure confidence 
on the Promise of the return of All men to the 
Love and favor of the Creator and Father of 
all ! And this is my joy ! The chief est of my 
millennial glory ! And this shall be our high- 
est Theme until the Lord God shall cause to 
come up out of their graves, all the nations 



106 MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 

that are scattered under the whole Heaven !' r 
Will Pilate and she, who was his wife, be 
there ? Will she tell the man who, against 
his better judgment, gave way to a brutal 
priesthood and delivered the Just One to death; 
that this is He, concerning whom she had the 
4 4 wonderful dream"; and that what is now 
transpiring was the perfect imagery of her 
vision ? Did Pilate in their banishment draw 
from his wife's prophetic influence and contin- 
ual pleadings, the Hope that sets him face to 
face with the Crucified ? 

It will be exciting to visit the shores of the 
sea of Gallilee, the Mount of Transfiguration 
and the scenes of the loaves and fishes. The 
prophet Elijah will explain to us how John 
the Baptist — being as great as any born of 
woman, was less than the least in the King- 
dom of Heaven, why he was no more than 44 a 
reed shaken by the wind ;" by informing us 
that, when Herod, at the request of a wicked 
woman, beheaded him in prison, his identity 
was lost ; and that the spirit and power of 
Elijah returned to the presence of his God. 
The Roman centurion who conducted the 
crucifixion will show us the arena whereon 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



10/ 



were enacted scenes of such vast import 
to the children of men. Perhaps, at the re- 
quest of the beloved disciple, the Master 
may, by the now freed law of atomic affinities, 
reproduce the Sacred Cross, while the re- 
deemed of the Lord — as they behold the sym- 
bol of the Faith that hath saved them shall 
shake the Holy Heaven and the glorified Earth 
with the exulting shout : ' ' Worthy the Lamb 
that was slain" thereon ; ik Salvation to our 
God w 7 ho sitteth upon the throne, and unto 
the Lamb." 

Thus onward, through this Edenic state, 
enjoying the happiness, the glory and the 
bliss of this Thousand Years ! beyond the ca- 
pacity of the present man to conceive. In 
his assured candidacy, with every shred of his 
accountability left in the grave ; with every 
possibility of future ill, evil or sin driven from 
his being, thoughts and future forever ! Grow- 
ing daily and hourly in knowledge under the 
loving tuition of the divine schoolmaster who 
will at the close of this millennium present us 
to His Father, 4 k holy and unblamable and 
unreprovable in His sight." Onward through 
the age necessary to undo the effects of diso- 



I08 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



bedience and restore us to the exalted condi- 
tion so often held to our view in the Book of 
God. His ' ' sure mercies" shall be ours! 
Nothing shall mar our joy ! Sin and sorrow 
and suffering shall be forgotten. Instead of 
gazing from the verge of the blest home, down 
into a sea of sulphurous flame, and listening 
to the wails and groans of agonizing torture 
and despair and remediless and eternal woe, 
we will, with one accord, lift up our hands 
and voices and bless Him who sitteth upon 
the throne for the sure and glorious hope of 
welcoming the glad return of all the nations of 
the dead to the acceptance and favor of their 
God ! What a source of happiness ! What a 
fountain of joy ! What a crown of rejoicing! 
What an incentive, reader, to seek a part in 
such limitless love, and be of those who share 
it in the blissful Thousand Years ! 

That the All -Father in His omnipotence 
designed in the beginning to make every liv- 
ing creature the recipient of all of happiness 
which his being, through all its exalted con- 
ditions, could hold, and that in the end no 
part of His supreme will shall be changed or 
frustrated, was the theme and inspiration of 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



109 



Prophecy ! The heavenly theme of glorified 
spirits around the throne of such love and 
omnipotence ! and will be the burden of the 
loud chorus chanted from the first conscious- 
ness of bliss in the new earth through the 
succeeding ages of eternity, and may be and 
and ought to be the theme of all, in this our 
Present ! 

O glorious, all-absorbing theme ! 
Song of the Universe — supreme ! 
Theme of the Seraph Choir above, 
Almighty ! Free ! Eternal Love ! 

If the inducements held out in the gospel of 
Christ should seem to fail in bringing a soul 
to His feet in submission, that soul must in- 
deed set a high value upon the treasures of 
earth. Or, perhaps, he purposes at some 
future day, when he has disposed of some of 
the business in hand, determining at all events 
to secure his eternal interests before his Pres- 
ent shall close. Or, he may have read or 
heard the specious dissertations of those who, 
in their unbelief, have thrown to the winds all 
ideas of accountability to any being greater 
than man, and are now ready to stand before 
vast audiences and direct their wit and sar-- 



I IO MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



casm against the almost universal convictions 
of mankind. 

These leaves would say to the world that 
back in the past as far as sacred or profane 
history is able to reach, both have brought 
down to us the fact that the maker of the 
wonderful works we behold was the object of 
adoration among the nations of the earth, and 
they acknowledged their accountability to and 
their dependence on Him. The same history 
will prove, beyond a shadow of doubt, that all 
humanity have in one way or another con- 
fessed allegiance to what they conceived to be 
superior beings. The idea of accountability, 
dependence and worship is the one grand fact 
of humanity to all save a few, whose supposed 
superior intellect and perception prompt to de- 
claim against them as visionary, unreal and be- 
neath the dignity of supreme man. 

For me, I believe that the confirmed unbe- 
liever in our God, upon his accession to some 
condition which others would call a blessing — 
something over which no human control was 
apparent, like a life saved or a calamity 
averted, needs must offer to some unknown 
Providence the incense of his gratitude. Is 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



I I I 



there a man who affects to doubt the existence 
of a being who is the Creator of earths visible 
wonders and the arbiter of its destinies, who 
has no innate misgivings in reference to his 
views ! Had the human race been as loudly 
called upon to accept the doctrines and exam- 
ples of a widely known teacher, who advo- 
cated free action in ethics and free scope to 
the appetites and passions, who proclaimed 
that the natural bent and inclinations of man- 
kind should be their sole guide and preceptor, 
and that there was no power greater than man 
to claim priority in our account-ability or wor- 
ship, would the world have bowed the knee to 
such a gospel? Would the world have kept 
his precepts and examples emblazoned in tra- 
dition and record? or, disgusted with its work- 
ings, turn in loathing and seek some higher 
system ! France has been made the broad 
canvas on which such conditions were most 
elaborately pictured. But in the most thought- 
less, the most volatile, and the most skeptical 
nation on earth, the consciousness of a far bet- 
ter pattern prevailed. ' k The fool hath said in 
his heart: there is no God," This text of 
Scripture stands proven beyond a possible con- 



I 12 



MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



tradiction, for folly has never more fully exem- 
plified herself than in the denial of a Supreme 
Being, or appeared in more idiotic features 
than in her effort to destroy our faith in the 
Christian religion. 

If, therefore, it be the glitter of the tinsel 
of this present life, if it be the unworthy wish 
to defer your submission, or if you have fol- 
lowed the counsels of infidelity and are 
tempted to deny the Lord that bought you : I 
ask you in the name of Him who has breathed 
the whispers of an unsatisfied conscience in 
your ears to -cast away these and all other 
causes, and bury yourselves deep among the 
words of life, and seek there for a doctrine, a 
hope and a surety which will bring you to the 
safest and best position in which man ever 
stood. 

It is not that your rebellion, your persist- 
ence in sin or even your denial of His exist- 
ence can affect Him. No, He desires your 
immediate and total surrender in order that 
you may be secure from the evil to come, and 
that you may show to others the withered 
arm that was restored, the eyes that now see, 
and the ears that now can hear. He does 



A THOUSAND YEARS. 



113 



not demand of you unconditional surrender. 
No, faith in His promises and confidence in 
His power is all He asks of you. Since the 
foundation of the world the stipulations of 
your surrender have been drawn ; and what 
beneficent, what loving, what lasting, what 
divine conditions on the part of a conqueror ! 

Jesus Christ is in no sense your enemy ! 
All of hostility is in your ranks ! Pontius 
Pilate, in mistaken appreciation of his pris- 
oner, deemed His aspiration to sovereignty, 
in the face of the majesty of Rome, as un- 
worthy of his notice. But the Sword of the 
Spirit pierced the heart of Rome in his own 
generation. The Kingdom of the Crucified 
was " not of this world !" 

How more than feeble and foolish, then, 
our resistance to Divine Power ! How weak 
and insignificant in the Divine Mind are our 
hostilities ! And how utterly wrong are we 
in our conceptions of this warfare. 

No, our Savior is in no sense our enemy. 
His is the 4 'Sword of the Spirit," and its 
thrusts are not "against flesh and blood, but 
against powers, against the rulers of the dark- 
ness of this world, against spiritual wicked- 
8 



\ 



I 14 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



ness in high places!" His war is waged, not 
against the creature of His care, His protec- 
tion, and the object of His infinite love, but 
against disobedience and sin and all the death- 
producing causes inherent since the fall. And 
His greatest enemy — and, if we but realized 
it, our greatest enemy — the common enemy — 
' ' The last enemy that shall be destroyed, which 
is Death /" 

Your duty to yourselves and to your fellow- 
man is to cast down the weapons of your re- 
bellion where you stand and walk boldly with- 
in the lines of the King of Kings, and render 
service in a better cause. And though you 
fall, you will not be utterly cast down, for He 
" will raise you up at the last day." Yes, on 
the Millennial Parade ground will stand all 
who were ever enrolled in the Holy Army of 
God, our warfare over, peace proclaimed and 
assured, and a ''Thousand Years" given in 
which to celebrate our victory. 



THE HOLY CITY. 



Man, from the day he was made in the im- 
age and likeness of his Creator was endowed 
with a love of the beautiful. Admiration for 
the starry host of Heaven has been to him a 
source of blessing, and only ceased as such 
when he forgot the Creator and worshipped 
His works. The attractive pageantry that 
was ever the accompaniment of idolatry held 
a powerful influence over the minds of even 
the earlier worshipers of God. The children 
of Israel gloried more in the splendors of the 
Mosaic tabernacle, and in the tangible mag- 
nificence of King Solomon's temple, and the 
glories of his reign, and in the pomp and pa- 
geantry of the dominion of the Messiah as 
pictured by the prophets, than in all the won- 
derful and miraculous dispensations manifested 
in God's dealings with them. The love of 
beauty, splendor, grandeur and magnificence 
is continued to mankind with just rules for 
pointing out its laudable uses and preventing its 
excesses and abuses. The natural effect of the 



I I 6 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



Creator's manifold works is beauty and splen- 
dor. The idea of beauty and magnificence is 
indeed inseparable from his system of arrange- 
ment. A glorious sunrise, the sun-kissed 
clouds in ether space, a gorgeous sunset with 
His Bow of Promise painted on the eastern 
cloud, the silver-faced moon sailing in serene 
loveliness, beautifying sublime night and car- 
rying in its path the hope of a coming morrow 
— like the christian's hope sown with his nat- 
ural body ; and hand in hand — viewing in 
loveliness, the fair flowers and the ''human 
face divine." All of these, and all of beauty in 
the works of Nature's God may profitably be 
enjoyed, but never worshiped. But glittering 
baubles and costly decorations of human art 
among the inventions man 4 4 hath sought out," 
he that hath "put on Christ" may not tol- 
erate ; for we may not wrest the money for 
their purchase from the needs of the poor ! 
Believing, therefore, that love and apprecia- 
tion of the beautiful was designed by the Cre- 
ator as a source of pleasure, through which 
the mind may be lifted to higher aspirations 
and fixed upon ''treasures in Heaven," imper- 
ishable and priceless ; we may justly maintain 



THE HOLY CITY. 



II/ 



that, in conjunction with Bible promises, 
beauty and grandeur, magnificence and glory 
will be large factors in Eternal Life. 

When the age set apart for the restoration 
of the obedient in Christ to a condition in 
which "the gift of God — Eternal Life" may 
be bestowed, when prepared to look upon the 
effulgence of Eternity. When the k k Thousand 
Years are expired, the Holy City New Jerusa- 
lem " will ' 1 come down from God out of Heaven 
prepared " — and for want of a more fitting 
similitude in which to express his idea of the 
perfection of beauty the Revelator finishes his 
description with what seemed to his mind 
most beautiful: "a Bride adorned for her 
husband !" 

And this arrival of God's Jerusalem opens a 
new era in the life of the children of men, and 
seals up Time, and reveals Eternity ! 



ETERNITY. 



The Bible establishes beyond contradiction 
the fact that the conditions of life lie in obe- 
dience to the will of God. Disobedience of 
His commands and the sum of those condi- 
tions may be found in the order following : 

i st. ' ' But of the tree of knowledge of good 
and evil ; thou shalt not eat of it ; for in the 
day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely 
die." 

2d. An unreserved faith in God's promise 
to Abraham. 

3d. Laws and observances belonging to 
the Mosaic dispensation, terminating at — and 
its moral reaching into — 

4th. The life, precepts, death and gospel 
of Jesus Christ. 

We have seen that the infraction of the first 
involved the dispensations of the succeeding 
ones ; and we find all the obedient of every 
age of the earthly life enjoying the bliss of the 
millennial era. 

Whatever may be the number of those who 



ETERNITY 



will seek and find safety in the blood of the 
only effective sacrifice before the first resurrec- 
tion, there must needs be more who have died, 
and will yet die out of Christ. The great mul- 
titudes of the heathen who flourished m the 
light of science and the arts, the countless 
masses of ignorant idolators whose climate, 
home and sustenance were almost an Eden ; 
who never knew the will of God ; and who ever 
have been, and are yet to be " beaten with 
few stripes/' will all — all — every one! hear 
the trumpet's call, and stand upon their feet 
in sight of the glories of the Celestial City. 

At that time will the prophet Ezekiel behold 
the realization of his vision in the " valley of 
dry bones," when he sees "the whole house 
of Israel " come forth out of their graves. 

Let us in imagination resolve ourselves into 
spectators of the sublime scenes to be here 
presented. Who are these millions coming up 
from beneath our feet ? and those rushing from 
North, South, East and West, and forming 
line in solid cordon around the beloved city, 
holding in their grasp the weapons of rebellion, 
while their leader in form of a monster incites 
them to attack the camp of the saints, with a 



120 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



devil's faith of conquest ? And while we cast 
our eyes to the brilliant walls and the massive 
foundations, we behold no preparations for 
defence ; no guard at the gates of the be- 
leaguered city, no archers upon its w 7 alls ; but 
instead the perfect serenity and confidence of 
the besieged. In utter astonishment we ask, 
''What shall be the end of these things?" A 
shining angel is standing at our side ; and 
as we cover our eyes with our hands to 
shut out the blinding radiance, he speaks : 
" These are the 4 rest of the dead.' 
These are they who had no ' part in 
the first resurrection.' Here on this broad 
plain, as far as the eye can reach, 
are arrayed in the rebellion in which they 
lived and died, the unsaved ! Every son 
and daughter of Adam, who, in their lifetime, 
sought not by obedience and faith in Christ the 
gifts of glory and gladness enjoyed by those in 
yonder blessed city are here before you ! 
'Stand still, and see the salvation of God!' 
Cast away all your human theologies ! Throw 7 
to the w T inds all the teachings and doctrines 
and sectarian dogmas that you have held so 
dear, for they are no more in the mind of our 



ETERNITY. 



121 



sovereign than the k small dust of the balance. ' 
Of so little consequence did He ever esteem 
them that he has never enumerated and 
condemned them. Obedience in one act of 
Adam, faith in the covenant with Abraham, 
a careful following of rules and observances in 
the law of the Mosaic dispensation, and Jesus 
4 Christ and Him crucified' were all in each of 
their prevailing ages that was enjoined upon 
you. He never issued a command, or offered 
a precept to men, that could only be compre- 
hended by Infinite mind. He never desired 
you to search out the hidden purposes that be- 
long to God alone. The Holy Spirit never 
presided at, directed, influenced, or applauded 
in the disputations and wranglings of human 
minds over human theologies ! The rites and 
ceremonies belonging to ancient Hebrew wor- 
ship avail nothing. How more than valueless, 
then, the sectarian conclusions that clustered 
around the hope in the Christ of God ! 

k 'But you builded upon 'the sure founda- 
tion,' and I remember well the demonstrations 
of ' joy in heaven ' at your repentance. Be- 
hold that vast concourse ! the far greater part 
of the accumulation of the ages ! Behold as 



122 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



contrast the saved in yonder shining city ! 
These all died in faith and have received the 
promise ! Those lived out their days in re- 
bellion against God, and in the service of the 
hideous monster who has marshalled them in 
battle array against ' the Lord of Hosts !' 
But this, his last deception, is the final act of 
his life ! How could you ever have supposed 
that yonder wretch, who bears the revolting 
impress of brute, w T hose only attributes are 
cunning, deceit and falsehood, whom John on 
Patmos saw in vision, and you now behold in 
reality as the incarnate spirit or evil, could, by 
his machinations, win from the Omnipotent 
Maker of all these worlds, the ruler of their 
harmonious circuits through boundless immen- 
sity, and the safe keeper of the destinies of 
their peoples, so great, or any proportion of 
the offspring of His creation, the children of 
His care, and the objects of His infinite love. 
Did the Bible teach you that God ever com- 
missioned that mass of concentrated sin to be 
the custodian of the sinners among mankind ? 
Had you sought out and accepted the sure tes- 
timonies recorded in Genesis, Exodus, Deu- 
teronomy, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, Nehe- 



ETERNITY. 



123 



miah, Psalms, Proverbs, Isaiah, Jeremiah, 
Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, 
Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zecha- 
riah, as prophets of the Lord, and Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, Pauls two 
letters to the Corinthians, Galatians, Ephe- 
sians, Philippians, Colossians, second Thessa- 
lonians, first and second Timothy, Hebrews, 
first and second Peter, John, Jude and Reve- 
lation, as apostles of the gospel of Jesus 
Christ, your confidence in the power and in- 
tention of God to save would have been 
greater and your hope in Christ brighter." 

I approach this part of our subject with a 
full realization of the fact that the involved 
questions have been treated by learned fathers 
of the olden times, and by the most profound 
theologians of a later day ; by men deeply 
versed in ancient languages, and possessing all 
the advantages of access to early history, and 
also to the traditions of the children of Israel. 
But we must not lose sight of the way of 
truth by taking for our starting point the errors 
apparent in their doctrines of the innate im- 
mortality of the human soul, and the eternal 
punishment of the wicked in the tortures of 
hell fire. 



124 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



The Pharisees and Sadducees, both, con- 
cocted a leaven of heresy, directly and vastly at 
variance with the character and attributes of 
God and their own Scriptures, as set forth by 
the mouth of His prophets, We will 4 4 be- 
ware " of their leaven in this respect as also in 
that of refusing to accept the Prince of Life 
in his humiliation, a most poisonous ingre- 
dient in their " old leaven," and we will glory 
in that " leaven which a woman took and hid 
in three measures of meal, till the whole was 

LEAVENED ! ! " 

The heresies of the doctrines of the immor- 
tality of the human soul, and the destruction 
or endless torture of the far greater part of 
mankind, were the results of misconstruction 
of the Bible account of the creation of man, 
and arbitrary expositions of the types and 
shadows in the promise given to Abraham, 
and perverse and wicked deductions from the 
great themes of prophecy relating to the com- 
ing and kingdom of the Messiah, and are, as 
we have abundantly seen, unwarranted — and 
not only that — but absolutely disproved by 
the word of God. If the countless number 
whom we have represented as standing before 



ETERNITY. 



125 



the bar of infinite justice have been joined by 
deathless entities — then, indeed, is their eter- 
nity of existence assured. 

Then, without having tasted of the fruit of 
the tree of life they will ' 4 live forever." And 
in point of duration of existence, the dwellers 
in k ' the City of God" who have partaken of 
the tree and the unsaved are alike. 

The doctrine of an endless entity in man de- 
tracts from God's wise purpose in the tree of 
life, and from the grandest hope set forth in 
the resurrection of the dead ! 

Access to the tree of life never was — and 
never will be — granted to a child of man un- 
der conditions of disobedience. It was to 
prevent the possibility of man's agency from 
working his remediless ruin that the powers of 
heaven became alert with purpose to prevent 
his approach, and that it was transplanted in 
the paradise of God. The children of the 
kingdom have partaken, and the life belonging 
to eternity is theirs. 

A dispensation differing in detail, but how 
much in results we may not venture to say. 
For the Tree of Life flourishes and yields its 
abundant burden in the middle of the streets 



126 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



and on both banks of the life-giving river in 
swift succession of fruitage. "The leaves of 
the tree were for the Healing of the Nations !" 

What a bountiful provision ! And for what 
purpose is it ? The saved in the Holy City 
secured access to the Tree of Life as their 
"Right!" There is no malady necessitating 
cure ! " They that be whole need not a phy- 
sician, but they that are sick." But the trees 
still flourish, and still the crystal river flows 
on, boundless, free, exhaustless all ! And 
again we ask, for what purpose ? 

Here is a good place to pause in contempla- 
tion of the mightiest consideration belonging 
to mankind. Here before us stand arrayed 
and arraigned, by far the greater human 
product of the ages. All who since creation 
have died in wickedness. Raised from their 
graves, from the sea, and brought from far 
lands whither they were driven, to render 
their account of deeds done in the body, and 
to submit to the judgment and sentence of 
outraged justice and mercy and love. The 
hypocritical scribe and Pharisee judged and 
condemned them long ago. Professed follow- 
ers of the loving Christ have judged and pro- 



ETERNITY. 



127 



nounced sentence of eternal torture upon them 
long before the measure of their sins was full. 
And there is little grounds for doubt that they, 
according to their theological educations, have 
judged and condemned themselves. But who 
made them judges over this vast assemblage ? 
It is well that God is our judge ! Represent- 
ed as He has been as the impersonation of 
wrath and cruel vindictiveness, I would rather 
fall into His hand than theirs ! I would 
rather be judged by Him than by the com- 
bined philanthropy of this world ! Yes, the 
Will for our happiness is His, and the Poiver 
is His ! But let us suppose in regard of this 
vast consideration, that the Patriarchs and 
Prophets, the Apostles and early Christians 
are commissioned to pass judgment and sen- 
tence upon this vast mass of capabilities of joy 
or pain, what would be the fiat ? Would it be 
like this? ''Children of disobedience, the 
hour has come when self-condemned you stand 
face to face with outraged mercy, love and 
justice. You have persistently refused the 
constant calls of the Spirit of Truth, and have 
followed the counsels of yonder loathsome 
monster. You have spent your earthly life in 



128 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



rebellion and sin. You have forfeited all 
right to immortality or its blessings. You 
have, in common with all flesh, paid the pen- 
alty of sin in Adam Up to this awful mo- 
ment the blood of Christ has been to you of 
no avail. That you may the more clearly be- 
hold the fruits of your wickedness, God has 
placed before your eyes in vivid and horrid 
impersonations, the aggregate of your unholy 
appetites, passions, rebellion and ingratitude, 
and there remains for you only ' a fearful 
looking for of judgment and fiery indignation 
which, glory to God, shall devour the ad- 
versaries ! The sentence, therefore, is that 
the god whom ye served, who is now endeav- 
oring to incite you to attempt the crowning 
act of your wickedness, together with all the 
lesser spirits of evil, shall be destroyed out of 
the universe of God by the whelming vengeance 
which He bears toward sin, and that your- 
selves in this destruction shall be saved ' as 
by fire.' And your sentence further is, that 
when your hope of conquering Omnipotence 
and the Camp of the Saints is riven from you, 
you look on Him whom you have pierced, bow 
the knee in eternal subjection and confess 



ETERNITY. 



129 



that our God is King of Kings and Lord of 
Lords." 

I cannot depict the abhorrent hideousness 
of incarnated sin ; that monster of horror that 
has been presented in prophetic vision ; that 
has been pointed out and cursed in the vol- 
ume of inspiration ; and was first personated 
in the specious plea and the temptation going 
on in the breast of Eve at the time of the fall ; 
but if we could invest with apparent form all 
our own sins, I know that the spectacle would 
appal us. 

Will it not interest you to seek out all these 
personations and incarnated imagery in the 
Bible, and satisfy yourselves as to what is 
represented by them. Seek out, also, how 
many times the fires that are mentioned — and 
have been by certain theologists construed to 
mean God's wrathful punishment of the damned 
of Eternity ; signify, when taken in the light 
of Divine Revelation, the Love and Zeal of 
our Creator in the salvation of all ! Learn 
there also how much of the smoke and the fire 
and the brimstone are prophetic of the use of 
gunpowder in war. John, by one of the beasts 
in his vision, pictures a cannon with astonish- 
ing fidelity : Rev. 9: 17, 18, 19. 9 



I 30 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 

When He, who is now our advocate at the 
right hand of His Father, was nailed to the 
cruel cross and endured agonies that have 
drawn rivers of tears from the eyes of the pity- 
ing children of earth, looked toward His home 
in Heaven and implored in earnest accents for 
the forgiveness of His murderers ; was it for 
those who were immediately concerned in His 
crucifixion, or the whole house of Israel, or, 
was it all for whom He died that He prayed ? 
And did that prayer fall short of the ear of 
Him to Whom the prayer was addressed ? 
And did He in those last moments prefer a 
request that He knew would not be answered ? 
Or is there hope in that petition ? and will not 
our High Priest in the awful day of judgment, 
take up the burden of that prayer, and in the 
Holy office of that eternal Priesthood, present 
His wounds, identifying the accepted sacrifice, 
and claiming the pardon of every one at that 
tribunal bar ? For, the mission of Jesus Christ 
in His death— whatever may be the conditions 
of His Priesthood as regards other worlds — was 
to abolish death in this ; and to restore man 
in his lost estate, to the love and favor of his 
God. I can find no period when this vast 



ETERNITY. 



131 



assemblage as it stands awaiting judgment, 
could have changed its opinions as regards 
eschatology ; and think therefore that they 
still hold the varied convictions of their earthly 
lives ; and that they are looking for such con- 
demnation as their earthly education has in- 
culcated. The idolatrous nations will confess 
— kk truly ours were no gods,'' and will — at 
once bow the knee in suppliance and worship. 

We may not propose to suggest the duration 
of their continuance under these conditions, 
and cannot state the amount of suffering 
they may endure. 

.Permit us to use a little human reasoning, 
claiming in the mean time however, no direct 
support from Revelation except as it is in ac- 
cordance with what is understood of the char- 
acter and attributes of God. At the coming 
of Christ when the second stage of the Chris- 
tian's life begins, all who were left in their 
graves were joined by all the living wicked ; 
thus fulfilling upon all the race the curse in 
Adam — "as in Adam all die.'' Now in the 
first resurrection a part of that all were " made 
alive " ; and in them, and to them the promise 
was fulfilled. If then, there was in the mind 



132 MAN: PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



of God no loving purpose of future good to 
"the rest of the dead," why then were they in 
Christ made alive ? and for what purpose ? 
when they had finished their rebellious career 
and were removed from all possibility of fur- 
ther sin ; except that they, by being raised to 
an immortal state of existence, might live on 
in eternity's weary cycles in hopeless and un- 
pitied torture ; no bounded duration however 
far set in the future, being long enough in 
which the vengeance of Him who — without 
their desire or consent — created them. Here 
before us are the dire results of "teaching for 
doctrine the commandments of men !" 

Witness the effects of pharasaic transmuta- 
tion of the Word of God as delivered to His 
prophets, into monstrous heresies ; in whose 
rabbinic counsels Satan was arbiter. Here 
are visible the fruits of disobedience. Here is 
the harvest of the willful idolatry of the chil- 
dren of Jacob, and the outcome of their theol- 
ogies. Here those who treasured the sophis- 
tries of skeptics. Here all w T ho gave loose 
reign to their passions and were hurried to 
their ruin. Here those whom Satan underthe 
name of rum has brutalized, maddened and 



ETERNITY. 



133 



murdered. Here are the heathen who were 
partakers in the curse of Adam, but who never 
knew the true cause of their sufferings and 
death, nor the way of escape. With what 
loathing and horror will they gaze upon the 
hideous phantoms resolved into living form, 
as the dire imagery of Sin. The goddess of 
Fashion whose labyrinthian garments are be- 
decked and bejeweled with the tinsel and 
baubles of the old life is revolting to their 
sense, and the gold and diamonds and pearls 
have lost their sheen. 

The k< fool, "who tk hath said in his heart 
there is no God," recoils from the repulsive 
figure standing before him with a Bible under 
his feet. 

That fiend of indescribable hideousness who 
tauntingly offers the goblet, is met with ago- 
nizing groans and bitter wails of recollection. 
At the pompous steps of the demon, Pride, his 
votaries are humbled, and cast their eyes in 
abasement to the ground. 

And behold, k 1 the Judge of all the earth," 
who will k> do right," comes forth and is en- 
throned in awful majesty within this terror- 
stricken circle, from whom at one glance 



134 man: present and future. 



arises a wild wail of utter despair : 0, ye tower- 
ing mountains, ye mighty rocks, ''Fall on us 
and hide us from the face of Him who sitteth 
upon the Throne, and from the wrath of the 
Lamb, for the great day of His wrath is 
come, and who shall be able to stand ?" 
Whether an hour or an age shall be employed 
in the final settlement of the affairs of the chil- 
dren of men, we may not venture to say, for this 
period belongs to "the times and the seasons 
which the Father hath put in His own power ;" 
but this, I think, we may safely declare : That 
it is the period involving the "work" that 
should be "finished and cut short in right- 
eousness, " for 4 ( a short work will the Lord make 
upon the earth." 

The wicked, by refusing the overtures of 
God's love, have missed the stage in His econ- 
omy of preparation for eternal life, and the 
strong measures found in the Scriptures are 
doubtless necessary for their "return." One 
view of the Holy City and the glory that illu- 
mines it, and the destruction of that " old ser- 
pent, which is the Devil and Satan," the de- 
ceiver of the whole world, and their rebellion 
gives place to despair, and is gone with every- 



ETERNITY. 



135 



thing that can ik separate us from the love of 
God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And 
see ! The sceptre is lowered and lovingly ex- 
tended, and the lifted up will draw 7 all men 
unto Him !" And they shall take up the song 
of rejoicing and shaU set their faces toward 
the shining city, "and all nations shall flow 
unto it." What is the theme of their song ? 
" Come ye and let us go up to the mountain 
of the Lord, to the House of the God of Ja- 
cob, and He will teach us of His ways, and 
we will walk in His paths, for out of Zion shall 
go forth the law, and the word of the Lord 
from Jerusalem. It is of the Lord's mercies 
that we are not consumed, because His com- 
passions fail not." All we, out of our own 
mouths, stood condemned, and out of His 
abundant purposes and love hath He pardoned 
our iniquities, " and there shall be no more 
curse r 

The times and seasons which the Father 
hath put in His own power are fulfilled, for 
times and seasons are no more. God's num- 
ber is full, and the mighty mission of Christ 
is fulfilled, for He came to seek and to save 
that which was lost ! and a full and entire 



136 MAN : PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



success lias crowned His Perfect Work ! Not 
one vestige of evil remains in this new state, 
and no remembrance of evil comes back to us 
from the old. 

The whole grand scheme and design of God 
in our creation, and the way-marks placed 
along our history from the hour when the 
spirit world glorified the Omnipotent Maker 
over the prospect of countless millions of liv- 
ing, beautiful and happy intelligences who 
should wear their form and be partakers of 
their eternal joy, down to the day when His 
purposes are completed, are easily traceable 
through the Scriptures, in spite of perverse 
rabbinical deductions and arbitrary misinter- 
pretations, or the debris of traditional and 
legendary rubbish thrown by irresponsible and 
truthless manufacturers of religious monstros- 
ities, or by the pride of scholastic arrogance, 
over the clear pages of Revelation. Yes ! 
plainly and in bright relief stand out the few, 
but all the requirements and conditions of the 
Father's " will concerning us." If we obey, 
emotions of the highest type of gratitude be- 
come ours, and the highest Hope becomes our 
sure anchor in our Present, and when revivified 



ETERNITY. 



137 



in the second stage of our existence and secure 
from sin, from sorrow, from pain and death, 
it will be ours to spend a thousand years in 
happy innocence and childlike purity as our 
preparation for entering on the next stage of 
a higher life. 

What will be the conditions of those future 
stages or cycles we are unable to conceive, but 
let us, with our best interests hi view, strive 
by obedience to prove, them. An infinite life 
of progress, of knowledge and of joy, how- 
ever, are certain. Here the geologist may 
seek and find unfailing data ; may trace the 
sure indices of his beloved science back until 
he lose himself in the awful eternity of the 
mighty past. Here the rapt astronomer, with 
eye unaided by human artifice, may compre- 
hend the almighty science that holds those 
myriads of worlds in their prescribed orbits 
and bounds. Here he may count them until 
figures fail to express their number. Here on 
spirit wing he may visit the far-off homes of 
unknown beings until he finds that his adven- 
turous pinions could never reazh the confines 
of the works of God, and find all lighted and 
cheered bv the smile and love of the omni- 



138 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



present. Then swiftly back to the white 
throne, and in raptures born of infinite 
surroundings, declare : O, Savior of all, thou 
didst say well that in thy Father's house were 
many mansions ! 

And so shall the astronomer and the 
geologist, and all seekers after knowledge, as- 
cribe glory and honor, and majesty and.power 
unto Him who made all creatures for His own 
loving pleasure and purpose, and for their own 
unconfined enjoyment. Then away — perhaps 
to the dark caverns of unformed and chaotic 
worlds, where a lingering recollection of a 
former dogma might prompt them to seek the 
flaming abode of the children of wrath, but 
where the attendant angel whispers them with 
an assuring smile, " There is no more curse !" 
And so on, on, through the ceaseless ages of 
man's future, ever learning and never grasping 
all. Never reaching the climax of perfect and 
all-comprehending eternal wisdom and limit- 
less LOVE. 



CONCLUSION. 



It has not been the intention of the writer 
solely to call up the conflicting questions of 
belief held by sectarian churches and taught 
by them as rules of faith to their members, with 
the purpose of assailing them as heretical, or 
to deprecate their place in Christian creeds, for 
he knows well, and has already conceded, that 
millions have been born into that kingdom 
which is the type of the 4 ' kingdom of our 
Lord and of His Christ," and that theirs is the 
surety of an abundant entrance into that 
triumphant church, the gathering in one of the 
children of God. He does not believe 
that they are of any importance as 
rules of faith, and is of opinion that, had the 
Divine Being considered them as savingly 
necessary, no more grounds for disputation 
would have been found, than in the gospel of 
Salvation through faith in the Promise to 
Abraham, and that of obedience in Jesus Christ ; 
and that there would never have been such 
conflicting renderings, such direct contradic- 



140 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



tions, such angry schisms and such irreparable 
losses of love and unity in the Christian Church. 
It has ever seemed that the religious priest- 
hood were unsatisfied with the seemingly small 
volume of the legal text contained in the Word 
of God ; and that priest and rabbin and scribe 
and lawyer deemed it necessary to build 
around the plain structure until the ' ' Law and 
the Prophets " were overwhelmed. I would 
be glad, could I persuade all who have not 
done so, to procure and read the Book of Enoch 
and whatever they can find of ancient religious 
tradition and legend, as translated from the 
Talmud and other Jewish and Ishmaelitish 
absurdities. I ask you to endure the disgust 
which will be sure to attend while you read, 
until you clearly perceive Christ's just reasons 
for His condemnation of ' 1 vain traditions " and 
4 'the commandments of men ;" and until you 
are ready to discard all down to the two com- 
mandments whereon "hang all the Law and 
the Prophets." 

For me, I fully believe that the doctrine of 
unconditional and component immortality, 
while it feeds the pride of being in man, incor- 
porates itself into his creed and is fruitful in 



CONCLUSION. 



141 



yielding errors which this age ought to be able 
to reject, is the parent of that sum of all fear- 
ful errors, the eternal punishment of the larger 
portion of mankind. 

There are many now living who can well re- 
member the time when the doctrine of never 
ending suffering by fire was believed to have 
been unmistakably taught in the Bible as the 
wages of final impenitence. And so believing, 
it became necessary to subordinate their own 
judgment and confess the equality of the pun- 
ishment with the offence. This, in later years, 
has come to be much too strong a doctrine, 
and the innate humanity of man has revolted 
against the cruel situation, and less of the ter- 
rors of the Lord have been preached. There 
is a manifest denial of that faith in the silence 
of many gospel ministers and evangelists on 
that subject ; and you are earnestly asked— 
should you not conceive the sentence of the 
final Judge to be sufficiently severe to charge 
the discrepancy to Almighty Love. 

This belief is, also, very evidently losing 
ground among those who have made no ex- 
perience in religious matters, and if they, with 
professed Christians would " search the Scrip- 



142 



MAN ! PRESENT AND FUTURE. 



tures " with the interest such a subject ought 
to inspire, it would become easily apparent 
that k 4 Jesus Christ and Him crucified," is, as 
far as the final welfare of mankind is concern- 
ed, the paramount concern of the children of 
men. And further ; that as in St. Paul's opin- 
ion, Jesus Christ and Him crucified was all he 
determined to know, and that it was all-suffi- 
cient for theology and a glorious abundance 
for salvation ! 

It has not been the design to place these 
pages before the reader in any other light than 
as way marks to lead him to the truth as 
pointed out in the sacred volume. There are 
only keynotes sounded to each principal fea- 
ture of the work ; for I believe that k 4 search 
the Scriptures " is the strongest influence of 
the Holy Spirit. And however acceptable as 
evidence the few arguments adduced may be 
to me, I have a firm faith that if men will obey 
the sweet influences of that persistent, loving 
spirit, and call around them the long list of 
true witnesses, and listen to their k k sure tes- 
timonies " with minds divested of traditions 
and sectarian theologies, a "day-star will 
arise in their hearts," light ineffable will chase 



CONXLUSIOX. 



143 



the darkness of doubt from the soul, the way 
to the foot of the Cross will be found, apathy 
and unconcern dispelled, an eager interest 
awakened, an entire surrender made and the 
grand object in man's creation accomplished, 
and his eternal happiness secured. 

It is not the design of these leaves to prove 
one by one the points they offer for considera- 
tion ; but to induce men to read for them- 
selves ; to compare prophecy with prophecy 
and spiritual things with spiritual, and to fol- 
low the line of man's destiny through the 
Word of God. And it, with the blessing of 
the Divine Author of that Word, some maybe 
induced to search the Scriptures through the 
instrumentality of this humble but earnest ap- 
peal, the fervent prayer of the writer will be 
answered, and bright will be his crown of re- 
joicing, and limitless the joy of the seeker. 



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